E 

43J 


UC-NRLF 


* 


SPEECH 


OF 


HON.  LAWEENCE  O'B..  BRANCH, 

OF  NORTH  CAROLINA, 


ON 


THE   PRESIDENT'S   MESSAGE; 


DELIVERED 


IN  THE  HOUSE  OF  REPRESENTATIVES,  DECEMBER  18,  1856. 


WASHINGTON: 

PRINTED  AT  THE  OFFICE  OF  THE  CONGRESSIONAL  GLOBE. 

1856. 


E4 
B75 


THE  PRESIDENT'S  MESSAGE. 


Tlic  Honse  having  under  (.".insidonition  the  question  of 
referring  tha  President's  Message  to  the  Committee  of  the 
>Vlu>!e  on  the  state  of  the  Union,  and  the  printing  of  ten 
thousand  copies  thereof— 
Mr.  BRANCH  said: 

Mr.  SPEAKER:  I  feel  n<r  hesitation  in  engaging 
m  this  debate,  because  I  do  not  think  it  either  jj 
unprofitable  or  a  waste  of  time.  I  do  not  think 
we  would  be  badly  occupied  if  we  were  only 
fathering  up  and  arranging  the  materials  for  the 
history  of  the  past;  and  probably  we  could  not 
be  better  employed  than  in  defining  clearly  what 
issues  have  been  settled  by  the  people,  in  order 
that  parties  and  individuals  may  conform  their 
conduct  to  the  popular  verdict.  I  do  not  think 
it  worth  while  to  inquire  why  the  people  decided 
as  they  did  decide;  but  I  propose  to  state  what, 
in  my  opinion,  the  people  did  decide,  and  what 
ought  to  be  considered  hereafter  as  settled  by  the 
<-,!»rttest. 

Before  proceeding  to  do  so,  however,  I  wish  to 
advert  to  one  or  two  remarks  which  fell  from  the 
gentleman  from  Indiana  [Mr.  CUMBACK]  who  ad 
dressed  the  House  yesterday. 

As  proof  of  the  deleterious  effects  of  slavery, 
whore  it  prevails,  the  gentleman  cited  the  fact, 
which  he  says  appears  from  the  census  of  1850, 
that  the  State  of  Georgia  has  improved  and  under 
cultivation  but  six  millions  of  acres  of  land,  whilst 
it  has  sixteen  millions  of  acres  unimproved.  Na 
ture  haa  been  bountiful  to  the  southern  States  in 
many  respects,  and  has  given  to  them  much  fertile 
soil;  but  if  the  State  of  Georgia  possesses  the  pro 
portion  of  good,  arable  soil — such  as  would  tempt 
cultivation,  whilst  so  much  unappropriated  land 
of  great  fertility  is  offered  by  the  Government  at 
no  great  distance  off — as  this  statement  would 
s.'tfm  to  indicate,  she  has  a  far  greater  proportion 
of  good  land  than  any  other  southern  or  western 
State  with  which  I  am  acquainted.  Much  less 
than  one 'fourth  of  our  land  is  desirable  for  culti 
vation,  and  hence  our  population  is  sparse.  This 
!*parseness  may  entail  upon  us  some  disadvant 
ages;  but  if  it  has  tended  to  preserve  us  from  the 
crimes,  the  isms,  and  the  furores  which  constantly 
afflict  the  thickly-settled  northern  States,  we  are 
amply  compensated  for  every  disadvantage. 

1  must  say  also  to  the  gentleman,  that  if  with 
slave  labor  Georgia  cultivates  six  millions  of 
acres,  without  slave  labor  it  would  not  cultivate 
wwe  million.  Our  soil  and  climate  render  it  cer 


tain  that  without  slave  labor  our  entire  crops  of 
sugar  and  rice,  and  two  and  a  half  of  the  thref 
million  bales  of  cotton  we  make,  would  be  anni 
hilated.  And  when  they  are  annihilated,  what 
would  remain  of  the  commerce,  trade,  and  pros 
perity  of  the  North  ?  We  have  the  satisfaction 
to  know,  that  when  our  northern  assailants  shall 
destroy  us,  they  cannot  themselves  escape  from 
the  ruins. 

The  gentleman  alleges  also  that  the  slavehold- 
ing  States  are  behind  the  non-slaveholding  in 
railroad  building  and  other  improvements.  I 
have,  read  such  assertions  in  newspapers  and 
else  where,  and  seen  them  go  forth  uncontradicted; 
but  they  shall  not  go  out  from  this  Hall  without 
being  exposed.  I  hold  in  my  hand  a  table,  prepared 
by  myself  from  data  furnished  by  the  American 
Almanac,  published  in  Boston,  showing  the  miles 
of  railroad,  the  number  of  population,  and  th< 
proportion  between  the  two,  in  the  Atlantic  States. 
It  does  not  embrace  the  northwestern  States, 
because  their  railroads  were,  to  a  large  extent, 
built  by  the  Federal  Government  out  of  the  com 
mon  property  of  the  Union,  and  furnish  no  indi 
cation  of  the  wealth  or  enterprise  of  those  States. 
I  take  those  States  embraced  within  the  limits  of 


§ 

. 

il 

!i 

c6 

•2 

•d 

s-s 

States. 

i 

'     3 

o 

'§.; 

i| 

£ 
!c 

1 

£ 

11 

11 

^ 

H 

1 

£^ 

^o, 

New  England  } 

State*, 

New  York,        J. 

6,477,396 

8,6-26,6-29 

8,074 

1  ,0"iO 

1,068 

New  Jersey, 

Pennsylvania, 

Delaware,         ) 

1    Maryland, 

Virginia, 
N.  Carolina, 

2,733,079 

4,539,958 

3,91-2 

700 

1,160 

S.  Carolina, 

Georgia,            J 

I 

New  York,       1 
Pennsylvania,  $ 

- 

5,409,180 

3,975 

- 

1,370 

It  appears  from  this  table  that  notwithstanding 

the  fact  that  it  embraces  the  densely-settled  man 
ufacturing  States  of  New  England,  with  their 
concentrated  wealth,  and  notwithstanding  that  the 
North,  in  trade,  has  always  held  us  tributary — 
our  wealth  and  our  patronage  contributing  mate 
rially  to  build  and  support  its  roads;  whilst  ours 
derive  no  patronage  from  them  except  as  an 
occasional  "  drummer  "  seeks  our  custom — yet 
we  have  built  and  now  have  in  operation  just 
fifty  per  cent,  more  of  railroad,  in  proportion  to 
white  population,  than  the  North  has. 

If  we  include  our  slaves,  free  negroes,  and 
Indians,  j( though  there  is  no  more  propriety  in 
counting  them  than  in  counting  the  horses,  cattle, 
or  other  live  property  of  the  North,)  the  North  is 
less  than  ten  per  cent,  in  advance  of  us. 

If  we  compare  with  the  great  agricultural  States 
of  New  York  and  Pennsylvania,  which  have 
coal  and  the  commerce  of  the  great  lakes  to  aid 
them,  we  have  double  as  much  in  proportion  to 
white  population  as  they  have;  and  counting  our 
slaves,  free  negroes,  and  Indians,  we  are  twenty- 
five  per  cent  in  advance  of  them. 

This  course  of  remark  gives  me  no  pleasure, 
nor  would  I  derive  any  satisfaction  from  such  a 
comparison,  if  it  had  not  become  necessary  to 
vindicate  the  manliness  and  the  enterprise  of  a 
great  people  assailed  by  bigoted  ignorance  and 
blind  fanaticism,  for  holding  to  the  institutions  of 
their  fathers. 

Satisfied  with  the  bright  deeds  of  the  past,  the 
fruition  of  the  present,  and  the  glorious  promise 
of  the  future,  I  willingly  pass  on  from  the  vin 
dication  of  my  people,  to  inquire  what  of  their 
rights  were  decided  by  the  recent  election. 

Throughout  the  canvass  I  saw  inscribed  on  every 
banner,  and  occupying  the  prominent  place  in 
every  party  platform — the  Kansas  and  Nebraska 
bill,  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  restriction,  non 
intervention  by  Congress  in  regard  to  slavery  in 
the  States  or  Territories.  I  saw  every  other 
issue  that  parties  or  individuals  attempted  to  place  I 
before  the  people  promptly  and  decisively  repudi 
ated,  and  the  whole  contest  made  to  hinge  on  this 
one  idea.  1  saw  the  Democrats  everywhere, 
North,  South,  East,  and  West,  not  only  accept 
ing  that  issue,  but  presenting  it  as  that  on  which 
they  demanded  the  verdict  of  the  country.  I  saw 
the  Black  Republican  party  endeavor  to  dodge  and 
shirk  that  issue,  and  pretend  that  the  real  issue 
was  slavery  or  no  slavery,  and  whether  Con 
gress  should  legislate  slavery  into  the  Territories, 
although  it  is  known  that  the  Democratic  party 
would  as  much  oppose  a  law  of  Congress  estab 
lishing  slavery  as  it  docs  one  prohibiting  it.  I 
saw  the  issue  clearly  and  decisively  made,  and  | 
the  verdict  of  the  people  clearly  and  distinctly  ' 
rendered  in  favor  of  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska 
bill,  in  favor  of  peace  to  the  South,  and  repose  to 
the  country  from  the  everlasting  din  of  slavery 
agitation.  The  people  have  declared  that  the  ( 
whole  slavery  question  shall  be  settled  now  and  j 
forever  on  the  principles  of  the  Kansas  and  Ne 
braska  bill. 

I  have  hoard  nothing  in  the  debate  here,  and 
read  nothing 'in  the  similar  debate  in  the  other 
end  of  the  Capitol,  to  make  me  doubt  whether 
the  issue  had  been  fairly  made — on  the  contrary, 
much  to  prove  that  it  was;  and  I  should  not  open 
ray  lips  but  for  the  course  of  remarks  indulged 
in  by  the  honorable  gentleman  from  Kentucky, 


[Mr.  H.  MARSHALL] — a  course  of  remark  calcu 
lated  to  fan  into  flame  the  dying  embers  of  slavery 
strife,  and  sow  dissensions  among  those  who 
are  striving  to  extinguish  them.  If  the  South 
desired  to  keep  its  institutions  under  discussioit 
here,  I  would  not  have  been  surprised  at  the  gen 
tleman's  remarks,  for  I  could  only  construe  them 
into  a  denial  that  the  recent  election  had  settled 
anything  in  our  favor;  and  if  it  settled  nothing, 
of  course  the  Black  Republicans  will  feel  them 
selves  justifiable  in  continuing  to  agitate. 

On  what  ground  does  the  honorable  gentleman 
thus  summarily  strip  the  South  of  all  the  benefit 
of  the  verdict  ?  He  says  the  Democrats  at  the 
North  represented  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill 
as  investing  the  people  of  those  Territories  with 
power  to  abolish  slavery  through  the  Territorial 
Legislatures,  whilst  the  Democrats  at  the  South 
represented  that  it  could  not  be  abolished  or  pro 
hibited  until  the  people  were  assembled  to  frame 
constitutions.  On  this  ground  he  charges  that 
different  persons  of  the  Democratic  party  place 
different  constructions  on  the  bill.  Now,  sir,  I 
may  admit  the  gentleman's  premises — I  do  admit 
that  some  persons  maintain  the  opinion  that  the 
Legislature  of  a  Territory  can  prohibit  slavery, 
whilst  others  maintain  that  it  cannot;  but  that  is 
not  because  of  any  difference  of  construction 
placed  on  the  bill,  but  only  a  difference  of  opinion 
as  to  how  a  judicial  question,  arising  not  under 
the  bill,  but  under  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States,  will  be  decided  by  the  Supreme  Court. 

The  bill  leaves  the  people  "free  to  regulate 
their  own  domestic  institutions  in  their  own  way, 
subject  only  to  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States."  The  friends  of  the  bill  all  agree  that 
this  clause  releases  the  Territories,  as  regards 
their  domestic  institutions,  from  congressional 
control,  but  leaves  them  to  be  controlled  by  the 
Constitution.  They  agree  that  they  are  author 
ized  to  regulate  them  not  only  in  such  manner, 
but  also  at  such  time,  as  may  not  be  inconsistent 
with  the  Constitution.  And  they  agree  that,  if 
a  question  arises  either  as  to  the  character  of  any 
particular  regulation,  or  as  to  the  competency  of 
the  Legislature  to  make  it,  it  is  a  judicial  question 
to  go  to  the  courts,  and  be  decided  not  by  refer 
ence  to  the  bill,  for  the  bill  contains  nothing 
about  it,  but  according  to  the  principles  of  the 
Constitution.  Up  to  this  point  there  is  no  dis 
agreement  among  the  friends  of  the  bill,  and  all 
agree  that  at  this  point  the  bill  stops. 

The  question  remaining  to  be  decided  is,  whether , 
according  to  the  principles  of  our  Constitution,  a 
Legislature  (especially  of  an  inchoate  Territory) 
can    make    fundamental   regulations,  abolishing; 
existing  rights  of  property  already  vested  in  indi 
viduals  under  State  constitutions.     I  admit  that 
on  this  point  there  is  a  difference  of  opinion,  but 
all  are  willing  to  abide  by  the  decision  of  the 
\  Supreme  Court;  and  as  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska 
i  bill  throws  no  light  on  it,  and  never  pretended  to 
i  decide  it,  the  gentleman  from  Kentucky  might 
I  as  well  charge  us  with  differing  in  our  construe- 
|  tion  of  an  act  referring  a  case  to  the  Court  of 
I  Claims,  because  we  may  differ  in  opinion  as  fa 
how  the  Court  ought  to  decide  the  case. 

Gentlemen  on  the  other  side  ask  us  tauntingly 
what  opinion  the  President  elect  entertains  on 
these  points.  I  undertake  to  say,  without  having 
any  special  knowledge  on  the  subject,  that  he 


construes  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill  as  I  and  choose  to  get  upon  it,  would  be  laughed  at  a* 

all  other  Democrats  construe  it.     What  opinion  aiming  to  transcend  its  powers.     A  Legislature 

he  entertains  on  the  judicial  question,  I  do  not  cannot,  except  on  a  special  grant  of  power  in  a 

know;   it  is  not  important  for  the   country  to  I  Constitution, exercise  any  of  those  powers  usually 

know;  and  gentlemen  are  probably  doomed  to  re-  j  considered  as  making  up  the  aggregate  of  sover- 

main  in  ignorance,  as  the  Executive  is  restrained  |  eignty,  much  less  can  it  control  and  regulate  at 

by  the  fundamental  principles  of  our  Government  ji  its  will,  and  annul  the  rights  of  property,  the 


from  endeavoring  to  influence,  by  the  intrusion  of  j 
his  opinions  and  wishes,  the  action  of  the  judicial 
department  on  a  question  pending,  or  likely  to  be 
brought  before  it. 


can   tell  gentlemen,  however,  what  I  think  ' 


establishment  of  which  is  supposed  to  be  the 
first  act  of  man  indicating  that  he  is  emerging 
from  barbarism. 

I  may  be  reminded  that  States  of  the  Union 
have  abolished  slavery  by  legislative  enactments. 


the  Supreme  Court  will  decide;  and  as  we  have  |!  Such  enactments  by  States  may  be  constitutional 
been  so  emphatically  challenged  from  the  other  !  i  —I  incline  to  the  opinion  that  they  are  not,  where 
side,  I  feel  no  hesitation  in  doing  so.  If  the  re-  j  the  constitution  of  the  State  does  not  specially 
suit  should  prove  me  to  be  in  error,  it  will  only  j  grant  power.  But  the  assumption  of  such  a 
prove  me  to  be,  what  the  clients  of  much  better  jj  power  by  the  Legislature  of  a  sovereign  State, 
lawyers  have  often  to  their  sorrow  found  them  ji  (sovereign  as  to  its  domestic  concerns,)  deriving 
to  be,  fallible  in  my  judgment  of  the  law.  My  j!  its  authority  from  a  Constitution  framed  by  the 
opinion  is,  that  the  Supreme  Court  will  decide  people,  might  be  sustained  without  its  following 
that  the  establishment  of  what  shall  be,  and  j  that  the  same  power  belongs  to  a  Territorial 
what  shall  not  be,  property — who  shall  be  citi-  j  Legislature  which  derives  its  existence  and  all 
zens  and  who  shall  be  slaves,  is  part  of  the  ori-  j  its  powers  from  an  act  of  Congress,  constitutes 
ginal  compact  under  which  individuals  enter  into  j  part  of  a  government  never  sanctioned  by  the 


society;  that  that  original  compact  must  precede  | 
and  does  create  government,  of  which  a  Legis-  ] 
lature  is  but  one  of  the  parts;  that  this  original 
compact  must  be  made  by,  and  is  presumed  to 
have  the  assent  of,  the  individuals  composing 
the  society  in  their  separate,  original,  sovereign 
character.  In  England  it  is  unwritten  and  undi 
gested.  It  is  found  in  Magna  Charta  and  the 


people,  confessedly  temporary  in  its  character, 
and  liable  to  be  altered  or  abolished  at  any  mo 
ment  by  act  of  Congress,  and  possessing  no  more 
of  sovereignty,  and  less*  of  independence,  than 
an  ordinary  moneyed  corporation. 

That  such  a  body  possesses  power  to  annul 
rights  of  property  acquired  and  held  under  the 
common  law  and  constitutions  of  fifteen  States  of 


the  Union,  appears  to  me  a  proposition  too  mon 
strous  to  be  entertained  for  a  moment  in  a  nation 


Bill  of  Rights;  resting  in  traditions  and  alluded 
to  in  acts  of  Parliament;  axioms  announced  by 

popular  leaders  and  embalmed  by  popular  ap-  I  not  prepared  to  revert  to  barbarism  and  anarchy, 
proval;   the   tumultuous  demands   of  rebellious         mi  " 
and    the   reluctant   assent   of  humbled 


masses 

kings — all  spread  through  the  history  of  a  thou 
sand  years.  Such  is  the  original  compact  of 
England,  unwritten  and  unsubscribed,  yet  known 
V>  her  statesmen  and  binding  her  rulers. 

This  shadowy  and  mythical  thing  is  the  original 
compact  establishing  the  rights  of  property  and 
the  relations  of  man  to  man,  and  the  Parliament 
of  England ,  the  Supreme  Legislature  of  the  King 
dom,  dares  not  alter  one  of  its  provisions  or 
usurp  one  of  the  prerogatives  of  those  who  estab 
lished  it.  In  the  United  States  the  original  com 
pact  is  set  forth  in  written  Constitutions,  accu 
rately  and  exactly  setting  forth  the  powers  to  be 
exercised  by  Government,  by  the  Legislature,  by 
the  Executive,  and  by  the  Judiciary — which 
with  us  constitute  the  Government.  The  basis 
of  our  whole  system  of  republicanism  is,  that 
powers  not  specially  granted  are  reserved  to  the 
people,  and  that  changes  of  the  fundamental 
policy  of  a  State  can  only  be  made  by  the  people 
themselves  in  their  sovereign  capacity,  through 
representatives  specially  elected  for  that  purpose. 
No  one  has  ever  attributed  to  a  Legislature  in 
this  country  sovereignty,  or  aright  to  do  what  it 
wills.  After  the  Constitution  has  declared  that  a 
particular  object — as  land — shall  be  subject  to  be 
appropriated  as  property,  it  is  the  province  of  the 
Legislature  to  provide  rules  for  its  appropriation, 
to  regulate  the  incidents  of  such  appropriation, 
and  to  protect  and  secure  the  possessor  in  its  en 
joyment.  But  the  Legislature  that  should  assuTne 
to  declare  that  land  should  no  longer  be  appro 
priated  to  the  separate  use  of  individuals,  but 


This  is  not  a  question  of  the  respective  powers 
of  the  State  and  Federal  governments.     It  is  a 


question  of  the  relative  and  respective  power  of 
the  Legislature  on  the  one  side,  and  the  sovereign 
people  on  the  other.  It  is  a  conflict  between  the 
constitution-making  power  and  the  law-making 
power.  On  the  one  side  are  stability,  security, 
conservatism;  on  the  other  are  change,  chaos, 
and  agrarianism. 

If  it  comes  within  the  scope  of  the  legislative 
power  to  abolish  slavery,  then  what  gentleman 
are  pleased  to  call  squatter  sovereignty  is  no  new 
thing  in  the  Government. 

The  bills  organizing  territorial  governments  in 
Utah  and  New  Mexico,  for  both  of  which  I  believe 
the  gentleman  from  Kentucky  [Mr.  H.  MAR 
SHALL!  voted,  and  both  of  which  were  signed  by 
Mr.  Fillmore,  provided  as  follows: 

"  SEC.  6.  That  the  legislative  power  of  said  Territory  shall 
|  extend  to  all  rightful  subjects  of  legislation  consistent  with 
I  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  and  the  provisions  of 

this  act." 

The  same  phrase  occurs  in  almost,  if  not  quite, 

all  the  territorial  acts  ever  passed  by  Congress. 
!  If  the  abolition  of  slavery  is  a  "  rightful  subject 
j  of  legislation,"  all  the  territorial  acts  have  con- 
l  ferred  on  the  Legislatures  the  power  to  abolish  it. 
i  If  it  is  not  a  rightful  subject  of  legislation,  but 
!  belongs  to  the  constitution-making  power,  then 
|  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  act  does  not  confer  on 
1  the  Legislature  power  to  abolish  it.  Gentlemen 
j  who  have  voted  for  such  territorial  acts,  or  who 
i  have  voted  for  Mr.  Fillmore,  may  take  which  ever 
|  horn  of  the  dilemma  they  choose;  either  the  Kan- 
I  sas  and  Nebraska  act  does  not  contain  the  prin- 


should  be  free  as  air  to  every  one  who  should  jj  ciple  of  squatter  sovereignty,  or  they  have  voted 


6 


for  it  and  are  estopped  from  urging  it  against  the 
Kansas  and  Nebraska  act.  For  my  part,  I  do 
not  think  it  a  rightful  subject  of  legislation,  and 
hence  I  do  not  think  the  act  or  the  Constitution 
confers  any  such  power  on  the  Legislature,  and 
I  am  satisfied  that  the  Supreme  Court  will  so 
decide,  if  the  question  should  ever  arise. 

Mr.  Speaker,  when,  in  1854,  we  accepted  the 
Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill,  we  accepted  it  with  a 
perfect  understanding  of  all  its  provisions.  We 
knew  that  it  referred  the  question  I  have  been  ex 
amining  to  the  courts  of  the  country.  We  aimed 
to  refer  it  to  that  tribunal,  because  it  was  a  ques 
tion  appropriate  to  the  courts.  We  had  confi 
dence  in  them,  and  were  willing  to  abide  by  their 
decision.  We  knew  the  act  repealed  the  stigma 
upon  us  and  our  institutions  which  had  been 
standing  on  the  statute-book  for  more  than  thirty 
years.  That  commended  it  to  our  favor.  But 
above  all  we  embraced  it  because  it  contained  the 
great  doctrine  of  non-intervention  by  Congress; 
because,  under  the  fair  and  full  operation  of  that 
principle,  the  question  of  slavery  could  no  more 
get  into  Congress  to  furnish  fuel  for  the  fires  of 
agitation,  and  to  make  the  main  element  in  elec 
tions;  because  under  it  we  and  our  institutions 
would  cease  to  be  a  foot-ball  in  the  political  arena,  I 
and  because  we  might  expect  peace  and  security  I 
instead  of  the  insubordination  and  insurrection 
which  northern  fanaticism  is  beginning  to  pro 
duce  in  our  midst.  We  knew  that  the  great  evil 
under  which  we  are  suffering  is  the  domestic  dis 
quiet  caused  by  congressional  agitation,  and  we 
embraced  that  bill  cordially;  not  because  it  estab 
lished  slavery  in  the  Territories,  for  we  knew  it 
did  not,  nor  yet  because  we  thought  it  insured  the 
establishment  of  slavery;  for  leading  southern 
statesmen  declared  their  great  doubt  whether 
slavery  would  ever  be  desired  by  the  people  there,  J 
and  none  thought  the  stability  of  the  institution  ' 
in  the  southern  States  depended  in  any  degree  on 
the  decision  of  the  people  of  Kansas.  We  em 
braced  it  because  it  removed  an  odious  and  un 
constitutional  discrimination  against  us,  and 
promised  to  arrest  congressional  agitation  on  the 
subject. 

Gentlemen  representing  the  slaveholding  States, 
who  have  had  so  recently  an  opportunity  to  learn 
the  temper  and  fixed  determination  of  the  people 
of  those  States,  need  not  be  told  that  the  con 
tinued  existence  of  this  Union  depends  on  the 
cessation  of  congressional  agitation  of  slavery; 
and  that  on  our  return  home  after  the  last  session 
of  Congress,  we  found  those  who  are  most  at 
tached  to  the  Union,  and  the  least  in  the  habit 
of  anticipating  its  dissolution,  declaring  sorrow 
fully,  but  firmly,  that  unless  we  can  have  more 
quiet  in  the  Union,  we  will  be  compelled  to  sepa 
rate  and  place  ourselves  in  a  position  to  fend  off 
intrusions  detrimental  to  our  peace.  The  South 
demands  peace;  and  peace  she  must  and  will 
have — not  the  heavy  and  stupefying  sleep  that 
follows  submission  to  wrong  and  insult,  but  the 
repose  of  health  and  vigor — the  peaceful  enjoy 
ment  of  acknowledged  rights. 

After  a  two  years'  contest  of  unparalleled  vio 
lence — and  at  times,  sir,  of  such  doubtful  issue 
as  to  overwhelm  the  friends  of  the  Constitution  I 
and  Union  with  gloom  and  despondency — the 
people  have  rendered  their  final  verdict  in  that 
high  court  from  which  there  is  no  appeal,  in  I 


favor  of  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill — in  favor 
of  peace  and  union,  and  against  congressional 
agitation  on  the  subject  of  slavery. 

Will  our  opponents  submit  to  the  verdict? 
They  cannot  successfully  assail  it.  They  cannot 
hope  to  get  it  set  aside.  But  they  can  do  what 
defeated — hopelessly  defeated — adversaries  gen 
erally  do;  what  Moloch,  in  the  great  poem,  coun 
seled  the  fallen  angels  to  do,  viz:  sow  dissen 
sions  and  foment  discord  in  the  ranks  of  the 
victors — 

"  Which,  if  not  victory,  is  yet  revenge." 

Foremost  in  this  labor  I  am  surprised  t£  find, 
and  regret  to  find,  a  southern  Representative — 
the  honorable  gentleman  from  Kentucky,  [Mr. 
H.  MARSHALL,]  who  voted  for  the  admission  of 
California  ivith  her  squatter  sovereignty  constitu 
tion,  and  who  is  fresh  from  a  contest  in  which 
he  sustained  Mr.  Fillmore,  who  instigated  the 
squatters  to  assume  the  sovereignty  of  Califor 
nia,  and,  in  effect,  wrest  that  valuable  acquisition 
not  only  from  the  South,  but  from  the  control  of 
the  Federal  Government. 

Will  the  Democratic  party,  especially  will  the 
southern  portion  of  it,  fall  into  the  snare  laid  for 
it  by  the  Fillmore  men  of  the  South,  and  the 
Black  Republicans  of  the  North  ?  Shall  \ve  quarrel 
over  the  bone  of  contention  cast  into  our  midst  by 
the  honorable  gentleman  from  Kentucky  ?  What 
ever  others  may  do,  I  will  not.  I  do  not  believe 
the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill  empowers  the  Terri 
torial  Legislature  to  exclude  the  slaveholder  with 
his  property.  But  1  am  willing  for  that  question 
to  take  the  course  of  other  constitutional  ques 
tions,  and  be  decided  by  the  courts  as  the  bill 
!  intended  it  should  be  decided. 

If  the  Legislature  of  Kansas  excludes  slavery, 
and  the  courts  decide  that  it  is  competent  for  the 
Legislature  to  do  so,  I  will  abide  by  the  decision; 
and  when  she  applies  for  admission  into  the  Union., 
I  will  vote  for  her  admission  if  I  have  a  seat  on 
this  floor.  On  the  other  hand,  I  hold  every  Dem 
ocrat  bound  to  vote  for  her  admission  if  she  ap 
plies  with  a  constitution  establishing  or  permit 
ting  slavery. 

We  seek  not  to  force  the  institution  on  any 
people  against  their  will.  It  is  able  to  vindicate 
itself;  and  if  its  advantages  in  a  particular  locality 
are  not  obvious  enough  to  enable  it  to  contend 
against  an  accidental  opposition,  it  will  not  be 
very  important  to  the  slaveholder  to  be  permitted 
to  go  there. 

Hence  I  cannot  see  that  the  question  as  to  when 
the  power  may  be  exercised  possesses  the  im 
portance  attributed  to  it  by  some  of  my  friends. 
It  is  certainly  of  too  little  value  to  distract  the 
country,  divide  the  Democratic  party,  and  harass 
the  South  with  a  new  issue.  All  agree  that  it 
may  be  exercised  at  the  time  of  framing  a  con 
stitution,  and  it  is  a  mere  question  of  (time. 
Every  one  knows  that  if  the  majority  of  the 
Legislature  are  opposed  to  slavery,  there  are  a 
multitude  of  ways  in  which  the  slaveholder  may 
be  harassed  arid  kept  out  by  hostile  legislation, 
arid  by  a  failure  to  provide  remedies  for  the  pro 
tection  of  his  rightst  Practically,  the  institution 
can  only  be  introduced  and  sustained  where  the 
majority  are  willing  to  tolerate  it;  and  one  great 
advantage  to  the  South  of  the  Kansas-Nebraska 
act  is,  that  hereafter  Congress  will  stand  pledged 


not  to  prevent  the  people  from  having  it  if  the  ma 
jority  wish  it.  It  is,  in  my  opinion,  a  beneficent 
institution,  and  wherever  it  ought  to  exist  it  will 
exist,  if  the  people  interested  are  left  free  to  con 
sult  their  choice.  To  establish  it  where,  from  soil, 
climate,  or  other  circumstances,  it  ought  not  to 
exist,  tends  to  we.aken  the  institution  everywhere, 
by  furnishing  plausible  arguments  against  it. 

Looking  to  the  relative  strength  of  the  slave- 
holding  and  non-slaveholding  States,  in  the  Sen 
ate,  which  is  the  only  point  of  view  in  which  the 
question  of  slavery  extension  affects  the  slave 
holder,  I  have  no  hesitation  in  preferring  squatter 
sovereignty  to  congressional  sovereignty.  Ay, 
sir,  I  would  rather  leave  the  question  to  the  first 
'hundred  persons  who  reach  the  Territory  than 
to  this  Congress;  and  we  all  know  that  our  chances 
of  impartial  justice  from  future  Congresses  are 


settling  a  new  country  have  borne  the  same  testi 
mony  to  the  advantage  and  necessity  of  having 
labor  that  can  be  commanded.  The  Spaniards, 
who  took  possession  of  Mexico,  the  West  Indies, 
and  other  portions  of  this  continent  soon  after  its 
discovery,  though  marching  under  the  cross  for 
a  banner,  and  fighting  in  virtue  of  a  bull  of  the 
{  Pope,  professedly  for  the  propagation  of  Chris  - 
!  tianity,  soon  reduced  the  feeble  natives  to  slavery, 
and  compelled  them  to  work  as  slaves.  Our  own 
venerated  ancestors,  who  took  possession  of  this 
portion  of  the  continent,  found  it  occupied  by  a 
more  formidable  and  warlike  race  than  the  feeble 
aborigines  of  the  tropics;  but  with  a  knowledge 
of  the  hardy  and  enterprising  character  of  the 
first  emigrants  from  England,  we  cannot  doubt 
that  they  would  very  soon  have  harnessed  the 
Pequod  and  the  Narragansett  but  for  the  timely 


exceedingly  gloomy.     In  both  branches  the  non-  I  arrival  of  a  Dutch  ship  with  a  cargo  of  African 


slaveholding  States  have  majorities;  and  in  the 
future  we  are  far  more  likely  to  have  an  acces 
sion  of  slaveholding  States  under  the  spontaneous, 


negroes. 


On  such  slight  circumstances  do  the  fate  of 
nations  and  the  destiny  of  races  depend.     The 


uncontrolled  action  of  the  settlers  in  the  Territo- 1  enslaved.  African  has  been  civilized,  and  gone  on 

increasing  and  multiplying  beyond  all  precedent; 
whilst  the  Indian,  rejoicing  in  his  freedom,  has 
receded  before  civilization,  a  prey  to  suffering, 


ries,  than  under  a  policy  molded  and  influenced, 
if  not  dictated  and  controlled,  by  Congress. 

I  know  not  on  what  ground  the  South  should 

entertain  jealousy  and  suspicion  of  the  early  set-  j  to  want,  and  to  barbarism,  melting  away  on  the 
tiers  in  the  Territories.  No  people  more  fully  j  frontiers,  and  carrying  nothing  but  his  boasted 
realize  the  necessity  of  compulsory  labor  than  i]  freedom  across  the  broad  prairies  of  the  West,  to 
those  going  forth  into  the  wilderness  to  conquer,  jj  the  base  of  that  great  mountain  range  in  whose 
and  reduce  it  to  the  use  of  man.  With  lands  to  i  icy  gorges  he  must  perish.  When  starvation 
clear,  houses  to  build,  farms  to  improve,  they  and  death  are  upon  him,  and  his  last  "freedom 
soon  learn  that  hireling  labor  cannot  be  com-  »v--'-1'"  '« 
manded,  for  the  early  settlers  are  all  hirers,  and 
none  are  hirelings.  And  they  are  not  usually  of 
that  canting  and  hypocritical  class  of  sentiment 
alists  who  hesitate  to  use  the  blessings  Provi 
dence  has  placed  within  their  reach,  for  fear 
Providence  has  erred  in  blessing  them. 

'Hence  a  most  significant  fact,  to  which  I  would  ! 
call  the  attention  of  my  friends  who  so  much  fear  i 
the  action  of  the  early  settlers.  It  is  this:  that  j 
every  Territory  which  has  been  left  free  to  select  i 
its  own  institutions,  has  established  or  permitted  j 


shriek"  is  heard  in  the  tnountains,  if  the  poor, 
friendless  savage  could  look  upon  the  well-fed, 
comfortable,  and  happy  African  on  a  southern 
plantation,  who  can  doubt  that  he  would  bewail 
the  chance  that  left  him  free,  and  made  the  Afri 
can  a  slave  ?  The  introduction  of  that  cargo  of 
Africans  closed  up  the  only  avenue  through  which 
the  Indian  could  have  been  conducted  to  civiliza 
tion,  placed  under  protection,  and  preserved  from 
extermination. 

It  is  a  curious  fact,  also,  that  as  the  priest  had 
been  the  foremost  in  enslaving  the  Indians  in 


slavery.  And  the  Territories  northwest  of  the  Mexico,  doubtless  as  a  means  of  converting  them. 
Ohio,  over  which  the  ordinance  of  1787  extended,  ||  to  Christianity — and  in  every  allotment  took  to 
petitioned  Congress  for  the  repeal  of  the  anti-sla-  !  himself  the  largest  share — so  the  New  England 
very  clause  of  the  ordinance,  protesting  against  Puritan  was  the  foremost  to  enter  into  the  African 
it  as  retarding  the  improvement  and  settlement 


of  the  country,  and  vainly  clamored  for  the  priv 
ilege  of  having  slaves.  California  presents  no 
exception  to  the  remark.  There  a  snap  judgment 
was  taken  against  the  institution  at  a  time  when 
the  expense  of  transporting  a  slave  was  so  great 
as  to  preclude  the  possibility  of  introducing  labor 
ing  men,  much  less  families,  through  which  alone 
the  institution  could  be  planted.  And  besides, 
California  cannot  be  said  to  have  been  free  to  se 
lect  its  institutions;  for,  as  Congress  was  then 
constituted,  it  was  well  known  that  its  admission 
into  the  Union  would  be  opposed,  retarded,  and 
probably  altogether  defeated,  on  that  ground,  if 
its  constitution  did  not  prohibit  slavery.  And 
there  is  reason  to  believe  that  the  anxiety  of  the 
people  for  immediate  admission  into  the  Union, 
and  the  well-known  sentiments  then  prevailing  in 
Congress,  constrained  them  to  forego  the  advant 
ages  of  an  institution  which  would  do  so  much 
to  develop  her  mineral  and  agricultural  resources. 
Nor  is  this  striking  fact  confined  to  the  Terri 
tories  of  the  American  Union.  Every  people] 


slave  trade,  and  secure  the  profit  of  reducing  men 
to  slavery. 

In  looking  over  the  face  of  the  globe,  I  find  that 
wherever  there  is  a  country  fit  for  the  use  of 
civilized  men,  but  which  civilized  men  have  not 
yet  occupied,  there  Providence  has.  placed  a 
savage  and  debased  race,  having  the  ability  but 
not  the  inclination  to  labor.  When  civilized  man 
comes  into  it,  I  find  universally  a  disposition 
manifested  on  his  part  to  enslave  the  inferior  race. 
The  necessity  of  his  position  compels  him  to  it; 
and  he  may  be  only  availing  himself  of  a  wise 
economy  of  Providence,  which  placed  the  inferior 
race  where  it  would  be  needed.  I  find  that  in  all 
our  Territories,  where  the  policy  of  the  Govern 
ment  and  the  sentiments  of  our  people  forbid  any 
attempt  to  enslave  the  Indian,  the  early  settlers 
in  every  instance  manifest  the  greatest  anxiety 
to  avail  themselves  of  African  slavery.  I  infer 
from  this  that  slavery  is  suitable  to  their  condition, 
and  that  they  realize  that  it  is  so,  and  will  con 
tinue  to  introduce  it  in  the  future,  as  they  have 
done  in  the  past,  if  permitted  to  exercise  a  free 


8   • 


choice;  and  I  have  no  fear  that,  under  any  con  . 
struction  which  the  Supreme  Court  may  place  on  j 
the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  act,  the  citizens  of  the  \ 
slaveholding  States  will  suffer  any  injustice  at  the  ) 
hands  of  those  whom  gentlemen  are  pleased  to 
call  squatters. 

There  are  many  in  the  ranks  of  the  Democratic 
party  who  differ  from  me  on  this  point — some 
hoping  and  some  fearing  that  the  people  will 
exclude  slavery  if  they  have  the  power.  We 
honestly  differ  in  opinion  on  a  matter  of  opinion; 
and  I  hope  no  gentleman  will  say  we  construe  the 
act  differently,  because  we  differ  in  opinion  as  to 
the  choice  the  people  will  probably  make. 

Mr.  Speaker,  I  advocated  the  Kansas  and  Ne 
braska  bill  at  the  time  it  was  enacted.  I  have 
advocated  it  throughout  the  long  and  trying  ordeal 
through  which  it  has  passed.  I  stand  upon  the 
bill  as  it  is  in  all  its  features.  I  will  make  no  new 
issue  on  it,  for  a  new  issue  involves  renewed  agi 
tation,  and  a  surrender  of  the  great  points  already 
gained.  Give  us  a  faithful  execution  of  that  law, 
and  my  constituents  will  be  satisfied.  If  squatter 
sovereignty  is  in  it,  it  gets  there,  and  can  only 


get  there  by  being  in  accordance  with  th'e  Consti 
tution  of  the  United  States,  and  whatev«r  is  in 
that  instrument  is  right. 

The  honorable  gentleman  from  Ohio  [Mr. 
NICHOLS]  said  much  about  "  Buchanan,  Breck- 
inridge,  and  free  Kansas."  Sir,  I  am  for  free 
Kansas;  1  am  for  Kansas — free  to  select  her  own 
institutions,  and  work  out  her  own  destiny;  free 
from  the  control  of  influences  foreign  and  alien 
to  her  interests;  free  from  the  withering  invasion 
of  fanaticism;  free,  as  Kentucky  is  free,  and  as 
North  Carolina  is  free. 

The  gentleman  from  Ohio  and  his  associates 
are  not  for  free  Kansas.  They  would  enslave 
Kansas,  for  the  hope  of  changing  the  social  states 
of  an  inferior  race.  They  would  enslave  the  white 
man  of  Kansas — deprive  him  of  his  political  free 
dom,  that  the  negro  may  be  free. 

Sir,  I  am  for  free  white  men,  and  free  States 
everywhere.  The  gentleman  from  Ohio  and  his 
associates  are  for  free  negroes.  1  am  for  free 
Kansas;  and  I  was  for  Buchanan  and  Breckin- 
ridge,  because  I  believed  them  to  be  for  free 
Kansas. 


SPEECH 


or 


HON.  LAWRENCE  O'B.  BRANCH, 


OF  NORTH  CAROLINA, 


ON 


THE  PRESIDENTIAL  ELECTION. 


DELIVERED  IN  THE  HOtfSE  OF  REPRESENTATIVES,  JULY  24,  1856. 


WASHINGTON: 

MINTED  AT  THE  CONGRESSIONAL  GLOBE 
1856. 


THE  PKESIDENTIAL  ELECTION. 


The  House  being  in  the  Committee  of  the  Whole  on  the 
state  of  the  Union, 

Mr,  BRANCH  said: 

Mi\  CHAIRMAN:  A  great  and  vital  contest  has 
commenced,  and  is  now  raging  before  the  people 
of  this  country.  If  we  estimate  its  importance 
by  the  magnitude  of  the  results  to  flow  from  it, 
such  a  one  has  not,  in  my  opinion,  occurred 
since  the  establishment  of  the  Government.  The 
portentous  flag  of  Black  Republicanism  has  been 
raised,  and  around  it  have  rallied  not  only  the 
fanatical  and  political  Abolitionists  who  profess 
edly  aim  at  the  total  abolition  of  negro  slavery 
everywhere,  but  also  a  body  of  men  far  more 
dangerous,  who  would  reach  the  same  result  by 
rendering  odious  and  proscribing  the  slaveholder, 
and  limiting  the  influence  and  checking  the  growth 
of  those  States  in  which  negro  slavery  exists. 
Under  the  folds  of  this  flag  are  found  those  who 
would  refuse  equal  privileges  to  the  citizens  of 
the  different  sections  of  the  Confederacy, «nd  who 
seek  to  destroy  the  equality  of  the  States  of  the 
Union.  The  party  formed  of  such  materials,  and 
aiming  at  such  objects,  is,  of  course,  and  must 
always  remain,  strictly  sectional  in  its  organiza 
tion.  It  has  no  existence  out  of  the  non-slave- 
holding  States.  But  as  those  States  have  a  large 
majority  of  Congress,  and  of  the  electoral  college, 
its  success  in  getting  entire  control  of  the  Govern-  ! 
ment  is  not  at  all  impossible,  nor,  under  the  state  j 
of  things  now  existing,  at  all  improbable.  I  am  j 
no  disunionist,  nor  alarmist.  Nor  is  Mr.  Fill- 
more.  But  he  has  warned  us  against  the  election 
ef  Fremont,  and  tells  us  that  one  of  the  conse 
quences  must  be  a  dissolution  of  the  Union. 

Mr.  A.  K.  MARSHALL.  I  think  the  gentle 
man  from  North  Carolina  does  not  correctly  state 
Mr.  Fillmore's  position.  He  says  that,  if  Mr. 
Fremont  carries  out  the  policy  of  appointing  none 
but  northern  men  to  his  Cabinet,  it  would  cause  a 
dissolution  of  the  Union. 

Mr.  BRANCH.  My  friend  from  Kentucky  is 
correct  as  far  as  he  goes.  But  Mr.  Fillmore  says 
Mr.  Fremont  wo«ld  necessarily  take  all  his  high 


officers  from  the  North,  and  that  such  a  course 
would  dissolve  the  Union.  I  understand  him  to 
intimate  very  distinctly  that  the  South  ought  not 
to  remain  in  the  Union  under  such  circumstances. 
Against  such  a  party,  openly  avowing  such  a 
purpose,  the  friends  of  the  Union  and  the  Con 
stitution  should  be  indissolubly  united.  Certainly 
nothing  less  than  the  arrant  folly  of  the  mad 
man  could  produce  division  in  the  minority  sec 
tion  at  such  a  crisis.  The  noble  eyad  patriotic 
citizen  of  the  North,  who,  scorning  the  dema 
gogue  cry  of  "  slaveocracy  "  and  "southern 
domination,"  stands  upon  the  Constitution  and 
fights  for  the  Union,  regardless  of  sections,  en 
counters  prejudices  which  demagogues  excite 
against  him.  He  maintains  a  cause  which  the 
ignorant  and  uninformed  in  his  own  section  have 
been  taught  to  believe  hostile  to  their  own  inter 
ests.  Ignorance,  malice,  and  fanaticism  taunt 
him  as  a  doughface  and  a  traitor.  He  withstands 
it  all,  because  he  is  conscious  of  right,  and  fear 
less  of  consequences.  But  when  lie  finds  him 
self  vilified  at  the  North,  and  unsupported  at  the 
South — when  he  sees  a  powerful  party  organized 
in  his  own  section,  for  the  avowed  purpose  of 
giving  that  section  preeminence  over  the  South, 
and  its  citizens  preference  over  the  citizens  of  the 
South;  and  when  he  sees  a  large  party  at  the 
South  refusing  to  cooperate  with  him  to  defeat 
that  party,  because  he  cannot,  consistently  with 
the  principles  on  which  he  has  planted  himself, 
advocate  a  discrimination  between  the  foreign- 
born  and  native-born  citizen,  he  may  falter  in  his 
efforts.  When  he  sees  a  large  part  of  the  South 
advocating  a  discrimination  between  the  citizens 
of  the  country,  therein  differing  from  the  Black 
Republicans  only  as  to  the  class  against  whom 
the  principle  is  applied,  may  he  not  commence  to 
inquire  whether  our  aims  are  more  justifiable  and 
constitutional,  in  this  respect,  than  those  of  the 
Black  Republicans  ?  We  have  slaves  to  perform 
our  labor,  and  no  foreigners.  The  North  has  ne 
slaves,  and  its  labor  is  performed  by  foreigners. 
The  North  may  claim  that  the  Constitution  guar 
anties  to  its  foreign  labor  as  much  as  it  guaranties 


to  us  our  slave  labor;  and  the  foreign  laborer 
being  as  indispensable  to  the  North  as  the  slave 
is  to  the  South,  the  northern  statesman  may 
refuse  to  defend  us  from  unjust  discrimination 
so  long  as  we  insist  on  a  discrimination  against 
himself  and  his  own  section.  By  such  a  course 
of  reasoning,  a  large  number  of  voters  at  the 
North,  who  would  otherwise  act  with  us,  may 
be  kept  from  the  polls,  or  driven  into  the  ranks 
of  the  Black  Republicans;  whilst  another  large 
number  of  intelligent  and  influential  men,  dis 
gusted  or  alarmed  at  the  folly  and  ingratitude 
under  the  influence  of  which  we  refuse,  on  ac 
count  of  minor  questions,  to  give  an  effective 
support  to  the  only  party  which  has  a  national 


or  four  others.     I  think  our  chance  there  would  be  wortSf 
that  of  both  the  opposing  parties  together. 

"  The  nominations  just  made  ought  to  unite  the  North' 
on  the  Republican  platform,  while  dividing;  the  South 
between  the  two  pro-slavery  parties." — New  York  Tribune 
of  March  I,  1856. 

The  friends  of  Mr.  Fillmoreatthe  South  should 
take  warning;  and  now,  before  the  heated  feelings 
of  partisans  have  supplanted  the  sober  calculations 
of  judgment,  they  should  determine  that  no  re 
membrance  of  former -contests  with  the  Demo 
cratic  party  shall  prevent  them  from  casting  their 
votes  for  Mr.  Buclianan,  and  appealing  to  their 
associates  at  the  North  to  do  likewise. 

Itis  obvious,  Mr.  Chairman,  that  some  excuse 


Ir  _,  ,  ...  _,  ._„  _.  is  necessary  for  dividing  the  South  at  this  fearful 

organization,  and  holds  out  any  hope  of  defeating  |l  juncture.  Unable  to  deny  the  palpable  facts  to 
Black  Republicanism,  will  stand  aloof  from  the  j  which  I  have  alluded;  compelled  to  admit  that 
contest.  1 1  the  Democratic  party  is  the  only  party  that  pos- 

The  continuance  of  Mr.  Fillmore  on  the  list  of  j  sesses  strength  in  every  State  of  the  Union,  and 
candidates  is  dividing  the  friends  of  the  Consti-  ||  can  hold  out  any  hope  of  uniting  the  patriotism 
tution  arid  the  Union.  Without  a  possibility  of  j|  of  the  whole  country  against  the  supporters  of 
success,  he  has  not  friends  enough  in  some  of  j  Fremont;  and  compelled,  too,  to  admit  the  sound- 
the  northern  States  to  make  it  worth  while  to  run  j  ness  of  the  principles  for  which  the  Democratic 
an  electoral  ticket  in  his  favor.  Without  a  reason-  ;'  party  is  contending,  at  least  so  far  as  the  ques- 
able  prospect  of  carrying  one  single  electoral  vote,  h  tions  connected  with  slavery  are  concerned,  the 
he  yet  has  friends  enough  in  many  of  those  States  i  southern  supporters  of  Mr.  Fillmore  are  driven 


to  cancel  the  Democratic  majorities.  The  whole 
country  knows  that  the  great  bulk  of  the  Know  i 
Nothings  North  have,  through  their  convention,  j 
nominated  Fremont,  and  that  the  small  portion  { 
of  the  party  who  are  supporting  Mr.  Fillmore  j 
have,  under  all  circumstances,  refused  to  support  i 
that  gentleman.  Hence,  it  is  a  well-known  fact,  ! 
that  two  thirds  of  Mr.  Fillmore 's  friends  at  the 
North,  if  compelled  to  choose  between  Mr.  Buch-  ' 
anan  and  Mr.  Fremont,  would  vote  for  the  i 
former. 

The  joy  of  the  Black  Republicans  at  the  con- ' 
tinuance  of  Mr.  Fillmore  in  the  field  is  not  re-  j 
strained  even  by  obvious  considerations  of  pru-  I 
dence  and  policy.  As  showing  how  they  chuckle  | 
over  our  divisions,  and  what  effect  in  their  favor  i 
they  expect  from  it,  1  present  extracts  from  the 
two  leading  papers  of  that  party: 

"  Such  is  the  programme  of  the  next  presidential  cam 
paign  ;  and  we  are  free  to  confess  that  we  are  most  thank- 


to  rely  on  a  few  frivolous  charges  against  Mr. 
Buchanan,  personally,  to  furnish  an  excuse  for 
their  extraordinary  conduct.  I  propose  to  devote 
a  few  moments,  and  but  a  few  moments,  to  their 
examination. 

1.  It  is  said  that,  forty-four  years  ago,  he  de 
clared  that  if  he  had  a  drop  of  Democratic  blood 
in  his  veins  he  would  let  it  out.     It  is  strange  that 
persons,  who  have  themselves  always  displayed 
such  mortal  aversion  to  Democratic  blood,  and 
everything  else  Democratic,  should  urge  such  a 
charge  against  Mr.  Buchanan.     But  it  is  not  true 
that  he  ever  made  such  a  declaration .     Mr.  Buch 
anan  himself,  many  years  ago,  publicly,  in  the 
newspapers,   pronounced    it" false;   and  a   large 
number  of  his  neighbors,  over  their  signatures, 
also  pronounced  it  false.     Not  a  particle  of  proof 
has  ever  been  adduced  to  establish  its  truth. 

2.  It  is  said  he  was  a  Federalist.  He  shouldered 
his   musket,  as  a  private,  and   marched  to  Balti- 


Mr.  Fillmore  and  his  friends  for  having  produced  this  i!  more,  to  defend  it  against  the  British.    If  he  was 
.    Of  course, nobody  will  vote  for  Mr.  Fillmore  who  ;|  a  Federalist,  it  is  a  pity  there  were   not  more 


ful  to  Mi 

result,     ui  course,  nonouy  win  vote  tor  Mr.  jfinmore  wlio  ;j  a  Federalist    it   is  a   pity 
would  not,  in  the  existing  state  of  affairs,  have  voted  for     Federalists  nf  tlin  n»Tm»  sort  in  tl 

' 


*•    ll  1S  sai(1    tnat  ««    approved 
tions   passed   by  a  public  meetin 


certain  resolu- 
in  Lancaster, 


the  Democratic  instead  of  the  Republican  ticket;  and,  i 
therefore,  it  necessarily  follows,  that  the  third  party  will  i 
draw  votes  only  from  the  Democratic  ticket.  The  only 

'question  of  principle  involved  in  the  next  contest  is  the  I  in  1819,  disapproving  of  slavery  m  the  Territo- 
extension  of  slavery,  by  the  direct  legislation  of  Congress,  j  I    •  That    was   tM?-tv-s«»v**n    v»»ra    no-n       Mr 

into  territory  now  fret- through  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  \\]  ilty-seven    yeais    ago.      Mr, 

compromise,  made  in  good  faith  in  1820,  and  resistance  to  [j  Buchanan  may  have  been  at  the  meeting;  he  may 
that  act  of  bad  faith.  ;'  have  been  on  the  committee,  and  still  not  have 

"Of  course,  with  tliroe  tickets  in  the  field,  the  triumph1!  approved   the   resolutions,  as  everyone   knows 

ernment— oppose  the  violation  of  plighted  faith  and  the  j!  w    °  .  ^?  m  tn,p  naolt  of  attending  political 

revival  of  slavery  agitation—  and  insist  upon  the  right  of  the  !  i  meetings.       *  ew  of  us  would    like    to    be   held 
people,  whether  of  the  North  or  the  South,  to  regulate  ;j  responsible  for  all  that  was  said  and  done  at  all 

"We  feel  assured,  that  in'the^approa^nin^  prudential  i  admitting  that  he  did  then  approve  them,  he  has 
contest,  we,  the  aggrieved  party  of  the  North,  will  tri-  \\  been  in  public  life  continuously  since  that  time, 
umph'."— New  York  Courier  and  Enquirer,  Marck%>,  1856.  jj  He  has  been  a  member  of  Congress  almost  con- 
" The  friends  of  free  Kansas  would  have  a  hard  battle  jj  stantly  since   the  slavery  agitation   commenced 
*'"±^.?S^  l!  and  not  a  single  vote  has  he  ever  given  hostile  to 

southern  institutions.  Throughout  all  that  agita 
tion  he  has  uniformly  sustained  the  rights  of  the 
slaveholding  States,  and  commanded  the  confi 
dence  of  the  purest  statesmen  of  the  South.  For 
more  than  thirty  years  he  has  been  conspicuously 


nomination  of  Fillmore  and  Donelson  at  Philadelphia,  and 
of  men  equally  obsequious  to  slavery  at  Cincinnati,  we 
ought  to  be  able  to  triumph  on  the  direct  vote  of  the  people. 
Should  the  Fillmore  diversion  throw  the  electoral  rote  of 
Pennsylvania  and  New  Jersey  to  the  Democratic  ticket,  we 
must  take  our  chance  in  the  House,  where  we  have  so 
recently  carried  the  Speaker,  and  where  we  should  start 


r ; ^  __ 

with  the  vote  of  thirteen  States  certain,  and  a  tie  in  three  |j  before   the  .^country  as  a  public  officer,   having 


tiori.  Was  Joseph  Ritner  (then  running  for  Governor)  an 
Abolitionist?  This  was  a  most  interesting  question.  If  he 
was,  then  no  friend  to  the  existence  of  our  glorious  Union 
ought  to  vote  in  favor  of  his  election  as  Governor.''  *  * 

"  Before  the  spirit  of  abolitionism  had  been  conjured  up 
from  its  dark  abode  by  political  fanatics  and  hot-headed 
enthusiasts,  all  was  comparatively  peaceful  and  tranquil  in 
the  southern  States.  Slavery  had  been  most  unfortunately 
introduced  into  these  States  by  our  British  forefathers.  It 
was  there  at  the  adoption  of  the  Federal  Constitution;  and 
this  Constitution  did  not  merely  leave  it  there,  but  expressly 
guarantied  to  the  slaveholding  States  their  property  in 
slaves,  and  the  exclusive  dominion  over  the  question  of 
slavery  within  their  respective  borders.  Such  is  the  clear 
language,  of  the  Constitution  itself,  and  such  was  the  con 
struction  the  first  Congress  placed  upon  it.  Without  this 
solemn  constitutional  compact  the  southern  States  would 
never  have  been  parties  to  the  Union  ;  and  the  blessings 
and  benefits  which  it  has  conferred,  and  will  confer,  not 
only  upon  our  own  country,  but  the  whole  human  race, 
would  never  have  been  realized.  Those  in  the  free  States 
;  1 1  who  determine  to  violate  this  compact  must  determine  to 
RS~  1 1  dissolve  the  Union.  The  one  is  the  necessary  consequence 


voted  in  Congress  on  almost  every  question  that ; 
has  ever  arisen  in  regard  to  the  institution  of: 
slavery,  and  never,  until  it  became  necessary  for  j 
the  Know  Nothings  of  the  Soutli  to  frame  an  i 
excuse  for  dividing  the  South,  did  any  southern  . 
man  charge  him  with  being  unsound  on  the 
slavery  question. 

If  further  proof  were  needed  of  the  high  posi- ' 
tion  he  occupies  on  this  question,  it  will  be  found  ! 
in  his  letter  to  the  Democratic  State  convention 
of  Pennsylvania,  written  shortly  before  his  nom 
ination,  and  in  his  letter  accepting  the  nomina 
tion  for  the  Presidency,  and  pledging  himself  to 
carry  out  the  principles  set  forth  in  the  Demo 
cratic  platform. 

The  Lancaster  resolutions  date  back  thirty- 
seven  years,  whilst  Mr.  Buchanan  was  a  mere 
youth,  and  before  the  slavery  agitation  had 
sumed  anything  like  its  presentYorm.  In  1838,  j]  of  the  other, 
nearly  twenty  years  afterwards,  when  in  the  i  "At  the  session  of  1835-'36,  (the  Congress  immediately 
Tirimp  nf  lifo  niwl  »  r-nnHirJ-.tf.  fr,r  P^no-.-r-Qc  anJ  preceding  Mr.  Fillmore's  Erie  letter,)  the  question  of  aboli- 
ife,  and  a  candidate  for  Longiess,  and  ,  tjoil  ,1Hd  occu,lied  much  0,-  Uie  tillie  aill,  attention  of  Con- 
when  the  abolition  societies  at  the  North  were  at  j 
the  very  height  of  their  treasonable  efforts  against  I 
the  South,  Mr.  Fillmore  deliberately  wrote  as  i 
follows  to  an  abolition  society: 

BUFFALO,  October  17,  1838.      j 

SIR:  Your  communication  of  the  15th  instant,  as  chair 
man  of  a  committee  appointed  by  "  The  ..fnft  Slavery  So    [ 


ciety  of  tke  coun'y  of  JErte,"  has  just  come  to  hand.    You 
solicit  my  answer  to  the  following  interrogatories  : 

1.  Do  you  believe  that  petitions  to  Congress  on  the  sub-  i 
ject  of  slavery  and  the  slave  trade  ought  to  be  received, 
read,  and  respectfully  considered  by  the  representatives  of 
the  people  ? 

2.  Are  you  opposed  to  the  annexation  of  Texas  to  this 
Union,  under  any  circumstances,  so  long  as  slaves  are  held 
therein? 

3.  Are  you  in  favor  of  Congress  exercising  all  the  consti 
tutional  power  it  possesses  to  abolish  the  internal  slave  trade, 


between  the  States.' 

4.  Are  you  in  favor  of  immediate  legislation  for  the  abo 
lition  of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia  ? 

I  am  much  engaged,  and  have  no  time  to  enter  into  an 
argument.,  or  to  explain  at  length  my  reasons  for  my  opin 
ion.  I  shall  therefore  content  myself,  for  the  present,  by 
answering  all  your  interrogatories  in  the  affinn«tire,  anil 
leave  for  some  future  occasion  a  more  extended  discussion 
on  the  subject.  MILLAR!)  FILLMORE. 


gress.     It  had   been   discussed  in  every   possible  aspect. 
Petitions  for  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Colum 
bia,  got  up  and  circulated   by  the  anti  slavery  societies, 
poured  into  Congress  from  the  free  States.    This  was  the 
only  mode  in  which  the  Abolitionists  could  agitate  the  ques 
tion  in  Congress,  because  no  fanatic,  to  Mr.  B.'s  knowl 
edge,  had  been  so  mad  as  to  contend  that  Congress  had  any 
power  over  slavery  within  the  slave   States  themselves. 
Petitions  to  abolish  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia 
formed  part  of  the  grand  scheme  of  agitation  by  which, 
the  Abolitionists  expected  to  accomplish  their  purposes. 
Throughout   the  spring,  summer,  and  autumn  of  1835,  a 
combined  attempt  was  made  upon  the  southern  States,  not 
;  only  by  agitation  in  the  North,  but  by  scattering  over  the 
J  South,  through  the  post  office,  and  by  traveling  agents,  the 
I  vilest  publications  and  pictorial  representations.     He  had 
I  himself  seen  many  of  them.    Their  natural  eft'ect  was  to 
!  produce  dissatisfaction  and  revolt  among  the  slaves,  and  to 


incite  their  wild  passions  to  vengeance. 


He  then  goes  on  to  depict  the  horrors  of  ser 
vile  insurrection,  and  to  denounce  the  Abolition 
ists: 

"  Under  the  influence  of  the  feelings  excited  by  these 
causes,  the  southern  members  of  Congress  reached  Wash 
ington  in   December,  1835.    Many  of  them,  with  sorrow 
and  anguir-h.  of  heart,  declared  that  if  the  southern  States 
ji  could  not  remain   in  the  Union  without  having  their  do- 

HP  was    iWtofl   tr>   rnno-rp^     «nrl   tlirnno-lirmf  !'  me*lic  P(!ace  continually  disturbed  by  the  attempts   of  the 
:SS,  ana  LI    Abolitionists,  the  great  law  of  self  preservation  would  corn- 


his   whole    career    there   uniformly  voted   with 
Giddings,  Slade,  Adams,  and  the  worst  enemies  j 
of  the  South. 

Whilst  Mr.  Fillmore  was  thus  cordially  endors-  '• 


pel  them  to  separate  from  the  North.  Immediately  after 
the  commencement  of  the  session,  and  throughout  its  con 
tinuance,  the  Abolitionists,  intent  upon  their  object,  sent 


immense  number  of  petition 8  to  Congress  for  the  abolition 
of  slavery  in   the  District  of  Columbia,  couched  in  lan- 

ing  the  doctrines  of  the  extreme  Abolitionists,  and,  j  guage  calculated  tp  exasperate  the  southern  members."  ( It 

',v;is  under  these  circumstances  that  Mr.  Fillmore  wrote  his 


as  a  member  of  Congress,  was  on  all  occasions 
voting  with  Adams,  Giddings,  and  Slade,  Mr. 
Buchanan,  both  in  Congress  and  at  home  in  the 
midst  of  his  constituents,  was  contending  against 
these  doctrines,  and  in  favor  of  the  constitutional 


Erie  letter.)  '•  What  did  they  ask  ?  That  in  the  District, 
ten  miles  square,  ceded  to  Congress  by  two  slaveholding 
States,  and  surrounded  by  them,  slavery  should  be  abok 
ished." 

He  then  goes  on  to  denounce  in   strong  lan 


dghts  of  the  South    On  the  18th  of  August,  1838,  y  the  a6olition  of  sla          in  the  District  of 

Mr.  Buchanan    addressed  Ins  fellow-citizens  at"'- 


Lancaster,  Pennsylvania,  on  the  political  ques 
tions  in  issue  in  the  State  elections  then  pending.  ! 
It  will  be  observed  that  this  speech  was  almost 
cotemporaneous  with  Mr.  Fillmore's  Erie  letter: 
and  the  contrast  is  most  striking  between  the 
broad  and  comprehensive  views  of  the  statesman, 
and  the  narrow  and  illiberal  dogmas  of  the  aboli 
tion  candidate  for  Congress.  The  whole  speech 
will  be  found  in  Niles's  Register,  volume  55,  page 
90.  Mr.  Buchanan  said: 

"  There  was  one  subject  of  vital  importance  to  the  peace 
and  prosperity  of  the  Union,  which  had  not  occupied  much 
of  the  attention  of  the  former  speakers,  and  therefore  he 
would  make  a  few  remarks  upon  it.  He  referred  to  aboli- 


Columbia,  and  concludes  this  brunch  of  the  sub 
ject,  as  follows: 

"  Impelled  by  these  motives,  the  Senate,  upon  his  mo 
tion,  after  the  petitions  had  been  received,  rejected  the 
prayer  of  the  petitioners  by  a  vote  of  thirty  four  to  six,  and 
refused  to  abolish  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia."  * 
*  *  "Thus  stood  the  question  on  the  4th  of  July,  1836, 
when  Congress  adjourned.  The  members  of  Congress 
from  UK;  slaveholding  States  and  their  constituents  had  a 
right  to  expect  peace.  The  question  had  been  fully  dis- 
<-ii<si  (i.  and  deliberately  decided  by  overwhelming  majori 
ties,  and  the  South  had  reason  to  hope  that  the  minority 
would  acquiesce,  at  least  for  a  season,  in  the  will  of  a  ma 
jority." 

But  Mr.  Fillmore  and  the  abolition  societies  at 
the  North  would  not  allow  peace  and  quiet  to  the 


6 


South,  but  persisted  in  an  agitation  of  the  ques 
tion  which  has  repeatedly  brought  the  Union  to 
the  brink  of  destruction.  Where  is  the  friend  of 
Mr.  Fillmore  who  will  ever  again  charge  Mr. 
Buchanan  with  unsoundness  on  this  question  ? 

4.  It  is  said  Mr.  Buchanan  is  favorable  to  fili 
bustering;  and  the  manifesto  of  the  Ostend  con 
ference  is  cited  as  proving  that  he  favors  attempts 
to  acquire  the  Ishind  of  Cuba  by  that  means.  Mr. 
Buchanan's  letter  accepting  the  nomination  ut 
terly  refutes  any  such  charge.  In  it  he  says: 

"  Should  I  be  placed  in  the  executive  chair,  I  shall  use 
my  best  exertions  to  cultivate  peace  and  friendship  with 
all  nations,  believing  this  to  be  our  highest  policy  as  well 
as  our  most  imperative  duty." 

From  a  statesman  of  his  conservative  character, 
whose  experience  in  the  conduct  of  our  foreign 
affairs  is  unequaled,  and  whose  prudence  is  pro 
verbial,  no  such  declaration  would  be  needed  to 
satisfy  the  country  that  in  his  hands  its  peace 
and  honor  would  be  equally  safe. 

The  manifesto  of  the  Ostend  conference  de 
clared  that  the  possession  of  the  Island  of  Cuba 
was  of  great  importance  to  the  commerce  and  the 
security  of  this  country;  that  our  Government 
ought  to  acquire  it  by  purchase,  if  possible,  and 
could  afford  to  give  for  it  a  very  high  price;  that 
if  Spain  should  refuse  to  sell  it  to  us,  it  ought  to 
become  the  fixed  policy  of  this  Government,  that 
in  no  event  would  we  permit  it  to  pass  into  the 
hands  of  a  maritime  Power,  commanding,  as  it 
does,  the  whole  of  our  southern  coasts  on  the 
Atlantic  and  the  Gulf,  and  shutting  up  the  whole 
of  our  Gulf  States,  including  the  mouth  of  the 
Mississippi,  in  the  event  of  war  between  us  and 
the  Power  possessing  it.  Such  were  the  senti 
ments  I  avowed  to  my  own  constituents.  And  I 
go  further  and  say,  that  if  Spain  should  attempt 
to  pursue  such  a  course  with  the  island  as  to 
render  it  a  dangerous  neighbor  to  us,  the  great 
law  of  self-preservation  would  imperatively  de 
mand  of  us  to  interpose  and  prevent  it.  If  there 
is  a  party  in  this  country  entertaining  different 
aentiments/I  would  like  to  hear  them  avowed. 

Whilst  Mr.  Fillmore  was  President,  the  best 
appointed  and  most  formidable  filibustering  ex-j| 

pedition  that  was  ever  fitted  out  from  our  shores  [|  storm  nor  howling  wind  could  ever  prevent  him 
left  the  Mississippi  river  almost,  if  not  quite,  ||  from  distinguishing  from  the  coarse  and  vulgar 
without  opposition  from  the  Government.  It  was  j!  English  of  the  native-born  American.  In  a 
that  led  by  Lopez  for  the  conquest  of  the  Island  j  speech  at  Cleveland  he  said: 

of  Cuba.      1  do  not  censure   Mr.  Fillmore  for  it.   j      "Fellow-citizens — when   I  say  fellow-citizens  I  mean 
He  no  doubt  did  all   he  felt   justified    in    doing  to  /  native  and   adopted   citizens   as  well   as  all  who  intend 
arr-p^t  it     HP  issuer!  hi*  nmei'iiTntion  wnrnino-'r IIP   I  to  become  citizens  of  this  great   and   glorious  country- 
is  proclamation  warning  UW3     ,  lh;ink          for  the  Cllthusiaitic  reception  yon  have  given 

adventurers  that  they  need  not  expect  the  aid  of  |J  me.  [Cheers.]  But  there  is  one  thing  L  regret  in  visiting 
their  Government  if  they  met  the  fate  they  might  !  this  beautiful  city,  and  that  is.  the  rain.  I  was  pained  that, 
reasonably  expect.  That  was  doing  no  more  than  j  while  I  was  comfortably  sheltered  in  a  covered  carriage, 
it  was  strictly  his  duty  to  do,  both  as  a  faithful  i:  J 
President  and  a  benevolent  individual.  But  the 


pendent  Treasury,  Mr.  Buchanan  contended  that 
ten  cents  per  day  was  sufficient  wages  for  a  labor- 
ii\g  man.  It  is  a  sufficient  reply  to  this  to  say, 
that  no  such  thing  is  in  that  or  any  other  speech 
of  Mr.  Buchanan;  and  his  enemies,  having  been 
repeatedly  challenged  to  point  it  out,  have  not 
been  able  to  do  so.  The  whole  basis  of  the  charge 
is  that  he  advocated  the  independent  Treasury. 
The  enemies  of  that  measure  contended  that  it 
would  reduce  the  wages  of  labor;  Mr.  Buchanan 
denied  it.  The  measure  has  been  the  law  of  the 
land  for  ten  years,  and  experience  has  shown  that. 
Mr.  Buchanan  was  correct.  The  wages  of  labor 
and  prices  of  produce  have  never  been  so  high, 
nor  the  country  so  exempt  from  disastrous  com 
mercial  revulsions,  as  they  have  been  under  the 
operation  of  the  independent  Treasury. 

6.  The  charge  of  bargain  and  intrigue  against 
Mr.  Clay.  Mr.  Clay,  in  his  lifetime,  and  his 
friends,  including  Pre'ntice,  his  biographer,  hav 
ing  exonerated  Mr.  Buchanan  from  all  that  was 
improper  in  that  matter,  it  is  too  late  to  found  on 
it  a  new  charge,  at  least  without  some  new  evi 
dence. 

These  frivolous  charges  are  only  intended,  as  I 
remarked  just  now,  to  excuse  the  Know  Nothings 
for  dividing  the  South,  and  to  draw  off  public  at 
tention  at  the  South  from  exposure  brought  upon 
the  Know  Nothing  party  by  the  proceedings  of 
this  Congress,  and  the  verification  of  every  charge 
made  by  us  against  it  last  summer. 

But  I  do  not  intend  to  be  placed  on  the  defens 
ive,  nor,  by  any  such  clatter  of  small-arms,  to 
be  drawn  off  from  the  exposure  of  the  misdeeds 
of  "  the  order"  of  this  Congress.  Let  us  briefly 
trace  its  origin  and  history. 

In  the  presidential  election  of  1852,  the  friends 
of  General  Scott  made  the  most  desperate  efforts 
to  secure  the  votes  of  the  Roman  Catholic  and 
foreign-born  population  of  the  country.  General 
Scott  himself  wrote  letters,  and  made  speeches 
throughout  that  portion  of  the  country  in  which 
they  are  numerous,  abounding  in  fuJsome  flattery 
and  disgusting  adulation  of  those  classes,  and 
affected  a  fondness  for  "  the  rich  Irish  brogue" 
and  "  sweet  German  accent,"  which  no  pelting 


then  editor  of  the  Union,  Andrew  J.  Donelson, 
now  the  candidate  for  Vice  President  on  the 
ticket  with  Mr.  Fillmore,  thought  otherwise,  and 
day  after  day,  through  the  columns  of  the 
Union,  denounced  Mr.  Fillmore  for  "  truckling 
subserviency"  to  Spain,  and  for  pusillanimously 
abandoning  American  citizens  to  Spanish  ven 
geance.  Indeed,  of  all  the  violent  abuse  heaped 
on  Mr.  Fillmore  by  Mr.  Donelson,  through  the 
Union,  none  was  more  unqualified  and  more  bitter 
than  that  founded  on  Mr.  Fillmore 's  attempt  to 
suppress  filibustering. 
5.  It  is  charged  that  in  his  speech  on  the  inde- 


o  rain  arid  mud. 

,  I  have  thought  a  man  could  hardly  call 
himself  a  citi/en  of  this  great  country  without  passingover 
these  great  lakes,  of  which  this  is  justly  celebrated  as  one 
of  the  most  beautiful  of  the  whole'  West.  ['  You  are  wel 
come  here,'  from  an  Irishman.]  I  hear  that  rich  brogue — 
1  lave  to  hear  it ;  it  makes  me  remember  noble  deeds  of 
Irishmen,  many  of  whom  I  have  led  lo  battle  and  to  vic 
tory.  [Great  cheering.]'' 

If  in  his  ardor  he  did  not  actually  vituperate 
the  natives  of  the  country,  their  exploits  as  sol 
diers,  their  virtues  as  citizens,  and  the  simple 
vigor  of  their  language,  were  overlooked  and  de 
spised,  and  the  irishman  or  German  who  had 
"  passed  over  these  great  lakes"  was,  in  his  esti 
mation,  a  better  citizen  than  a  native  of  my  State 
who  had  never  seen  them. 


*  In  that  celebrated  letter  in  which  he  accepted 
the  nomination,  "  with  the  resolutions  annexed," 
he  declared  that,  if  elected  to  the  Presidency,  he 
would  favor  such  a  change  in  the  naturalization 
laws  as  would  "  give  to  all  foreigners  the  right  of 
citizenship  who  shall  faithfully  serve,  in  time  of 
war,  one  year  on  board  of  our  public  ships  or  in 
our  land  forces,"  thus  proposing  to  give  to  a  for 
eigner,  who  had  served  one  year  in  the  Mediter 
ranean,  or  on  the  coast  of  Africa,  or  in  Mexico, 
who  had  never  been  in  this  country,  nor  attended 
an  election,  and  who  of  course  had  no  opportu 
nity  to  learn  anything  of  our  laws  and  customs, 
the  full  rights  of  citizenship.  He  proposed  to 
let  such  a  foreigner  vote  the  very  first  day  his 
foot  ever  trod  on  American  soil.  Nine  tenths  of 
those  who  are  now  so  clamorous  for  "  Americans 
to  rule  America"  were  the  warm  friends  of  Gen 
eral  Scott,  defended  this  letter  from  the  attacks 
of  the  Democrats,  and  gave  to  the  people  as 
many  assurances  of  his  soundness  as  they  now 
give  of  the  soundness  of  Mr.  Fillmoje.  So  much 
for  the  foreigners  in  1852. 

The  Roman  Catholics  were  equally  courted. 
One  of  the  reasons  urged  by  those  who  are  now 
Know  Nothings  against  the  election  of  General 
Pierce  was,  that  the  State  in  which  he  lived  (New 
Hampshire)  excluded  them  from  office.  The 
Louisville  Journal,  then  one  of  the  leading  Scott 
papers,  and  now  one  of  the  leading  Know  Nothing 
organs,  said: 

•'They  (the  American  people)  will  not  consent  that  the 
New  Hampshire  Democracy,  who  recently  voted,  by  an 
overwhelming  majority,  in  favor  of  Catholic  disability  to 
hold  office,  shall  have  the  honor  to  give  a  President  to  the 
nation.  They  would  greatly  prefer  that  this  honor  shall 
be  accorded  to  some  State  not  disgraced  by  such  abominable 


General  Pierce  's  friends  proved  that  he  was  op 
posed  to  excluding  Roman  Catholics  from  office 
on  account  of  their  religion,  and  that  he  had  done 
all  he  could  to  get  the  disability  removed;  there 
upon  the  same  editor  said: 

-  If  that  was  all  that  General  Pierce  could  say  or  do 
towards  relieving  New  Hampshire  of  a  disgrace  that  causes 
her  to  be  regarded  with  scorn  by  every  liberal-minded  man  in 
the  United  States  and  in  the  world,  we  ask  if  he  is  fit  to  be 
President?" 

The  constitution  of  North  Carolina  had,  at  one 
time,  like  that  of  New  Hampshire,  contained  a 
clause  excluding  Catholics  from  holding  office. 
I  find  in  the  National  Intelligencer  of  4th  Septem 
ber,  1852,  a  defense  of  Governor  Graham,  the 
candidate  for  Vice  President,  against  what  was 
then  considered  by  his  friends  a  most  heinous 
charge  —  a  suspicion  that  he  was  in  favor  of  ex 
cluding  Catholics  from  office.  I  read  from  it  as 
follows: 

c:  GOVKRXOR  GRAHAM  AXD  BELIOIOCS  TESTS.—  Several 
«f  the  Democratic  presses,  perceiving  that  their  candidate 
for  the  Presidency  is  likely  to  be  prejudiced  by  the  odious 
religious  test  in  the  constitution  of  New  Hampshire,  affect 
TO  believe  that  Governor  Graham,  the  Whig  candidate  for 
Vice  President,  is  not  as  tolerant  as  he  should  be,  and  'one 
of  them  has  even  gone  yo  f";ir  a.s  to  declare  that  Mr.  Graham 
was  opposed  to  the  reform  in  the  constitution  of  North 
Carolina,  by  which  a  similar  restriction  was  abrogated." 
*  *  *  "  In  an  address  to  the  people,  dated  June, 
1833,  while  the  election  of  Governor  Graham  was  pending, 
they  (bis  friends)  declared  that  it  was  a  'disgrace  to  any 
free  people  to  tyrannize  over  the  consciences  of  others,' 
and  pronounced  the  obnoxious  provision  '  an  odious  restric 
tion  upon  conscience.?" 

The  article  quotes,  in  his  further  defense,  an 


address  signed  by  Governor  Graham  and  others, 
date€  January,  1834,  as  follows: 

"The  thirty-second  article  of  the  constitution  excludes 
from  civil  office  all  who  may  deny  the  truth  of  the  Protestant 
religion.  This  has  no  practical  effect,  for  the  plain  reason 
that  there  is  no  tribunal  established  by  the  constitution  to 
determine  a  man's  faith.  It  is  an  Odious  badge  of  prejudice, 
which  the  enlightened  liberality  of  the  present  day  should 
scorn  to  wear.  It  is  an  unjust  imputation  against  the 
Catholics  of  this  State  to  attach  to  them  any  such  disquali 
fication.  The  patriotism,  personal  virtues,  and  ability,  and 
the  disinterested  public  services  of  a  single  individual  in  the 
State,  brand  with  falsehood  the  idle  fears  that  are  implied 
by  this  paper  restriction .  How  far  it  is  consistent  with  the 
spirit  of  Protestantism  itself— how  far  it  is  compatible  with 
the  bill  of  rights,  which  declares  '  that  all  men  have  a  nat 
ural  and  inalienable  right  to  worship  God  according  to  the 
dictates  of  their  own  conscience,'  we  leave  to  that  bigotry 
which  would  perpetuate  this  stigma." 

Up  to  this  period  Catholics  and  foreigners  were 
in  high  favor.     In  two  years  from  that  time  we 
j  find  these  same  persons  swearing  voters,  on  the 
Holy  Bible,  to  exclude  from  all  offices  all  Roman 
j  Catholics,  and  even  those  having  Roman  Cath 
olic  wives  or  parents;  inflicting  on  the  rebellious 
member  who  should  vote  for  a  Catholic,  or  con 
tinue  one  in  office  under  him,  "  cruel  and  unusual 
punishments,"  such  as  the  Constitution  forbids 
the  courts  to  inflict,  and  such  as  no  humane  jury 
man  would  prescribe  for  a  thief  or  a  robber;  post 
ing  him  from  council  to  council  as  a  liar  and  a 
traitor,  as  a  dangerous  and  outlawed  runaway 
j  negro  would  be  posted  from  cross-road  to  cross 
road  ;    demanding   of   every   true    and   faithful 
"brother"  to  shun  and  despise  him,  and  to  use 
every  possible  effort  to  reduce  him  and  his  family 
I  to  beggary  and  starvation.     The  foreigners  and 
1  Roman  Catholics  refused  to  take  the  bait  held  out 
to  them,  and,  as  was  alleged  by.  General  Scott's 
friends,  generally  voted  for  General  Pierce — thus 
proving  that,  as  a  class,  they  are  not  so  easily 
duped  by  politicians  and  misled  by  demagogues 
as  the  Know  Nothings  allege. 

Having  wooed  warmly,  General  Scott's  friends 
hated  intensely  the  classes  who  had  thus,  inno 
cently  on  their  part,  been  made  the  object  of  so 
much  lust.  The  same  individuals  who  had  endeav- 
jored,  two  years  before,  to  bring  about  such  a 
change  in  the  naturalization  law  as  to  permit  a 
foreigner  to  be  naturalized  on  one  year's  service 
in  the  Army  or  Navy,  proposed,  in  1854,  that  no 
foreigner  should  ever  be  permitted  to  vote.  And 
those  who,  in  1852,  had  contended  that  General 
Pierce  ought  not  to  be  elected  President,  because 
his  State  retained  in  its  constitution  a  clause 
excluding  Catholics  from  office,  endeavored,  in 
1854,  with  just  as  much  appearance  of  sincerity, 
to  convince  the  people  that  to  permit  Catholics 
to  hold  office  was  in  effect  to  place  the  country 
I  under  the  dominion  of  the  Pope  of  Rome. 

Such  was  the  origin  of  the  party;  and  there  is 
I  too  much  reason  to  believe  that  it  arose  more 
I  from  spite  and  disappointment,  than  from  solici- 
|  tude  about  our  institutions  or  our  religion. 

The  party  sprang  up  in  the  North  just  pre- 
!  vious  to  the  passage  of  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska 
;  bill  in  May,  1854.     In  the  midst  of  the  excite 
ment  produced  by  the  passage  of  that  bilj,  the 
elections  for  members  of  the  present  House  took 
place;  and  availing  itself  thereof,  it  defeated  the 
|  Democratic  party  in   every  northern  State.     Of 
j  the  one  hundred  and  forty -three 'members  of  this 
j  House  from  the  North,  ninety-one  were  elected 
!  n»  Know  Nothings;   and  of  these  ninety-one, 


8 


severity-five  voted  for  Mr.  BANKS,  also  a  Know 
Nothing,  for  Speaker.  Every  Black  Republican 
voted  with  them;  not  a  single  Democrat  voted 
for  him.  A  list  of  the  names  having  been  read 
on  this  floor  in  April  last,  by  my  friend  from 
Tennessee,  [Mr.  SMITH,]  and  properly  corrected, 
I  will  append  it  to  my  printed  speech  as  authentic. 
On  the  26th  January,  the  gentleman  from  In 
diana,  [Mr.  DUNN,]  now  at  the  head  of  the  Fill- 
more  electoral  ticket  in  that  State,  introduced  into 
this  House  the  following  resolution,  which,  it 
will  be  observed,  goes  further  than  the  Black 
Republican  platform: 

"  Resolved,  That  said  restriction  (the  Missouri  compro 
mise)  ought  to  be  restored,  as  an  act  of  justice  to  all  the 
people  of  the  United  States,  as  a  proper  vindication  of  tlie 
wisdom,  patriotism,  and  plighted  honor  of  the  great  states 
men  who  imposed  it,  and  as  a  necessary  and  certain  means 
of  reviving  that  concord  and  harmony  among  the  States  of 
the  American  Union  which  are  essential  to  the  welfare  of 
our  people,  and  the  perpetuity  of  our  institutions." 

On  this  resolution,  every  Democrat  in  the 
House  voted  "  No. "  Only  three  northern  Know 
Nothings  voted  against  it — eighty-eight  of  them, 
with  all  the  Black  Republicans,  voting  for  it,  or 
absent. 

On  the  bill  to  admit  Kansas  into  the  Union  on 
the  revolutionary  Topeka  constitution,  got  up  by 
the  Free-Soil  party  in  that  Territory,  the  vote 
was  about  the  same.  All  the  Black  Republicans, 
and  all  the  northern  Know  Nothings,  except 
seven,  voting  for  its  admission;  and  all  the  Dem 
ocrats,  except  one,  voting  against  it. 

It  was  known  to  well-informed  persons  at  the 
South,  at  the  time  these  individuals  were  elected 
to  Congress,  that  they  were  Free-Soilers,  and 
that  on  Free-Soil  principles  they  had  defeated 
sound  national  Democrats.  But  the  elections 
were  pending  in  the  South;  and  the  fact  was 
boldly  and  unblushingly  denied  by  the  Know 
Nothings,  in  the  full  trust  that  the  rottenness  of 
their  associates  could  not  be  exposed  until  it  was 
too  late  to  affect  our  elections.  I  happen  to  have 
before  me  the  North  Carolina  Star,  the  news 
paper  organ  of  "  the  order"  in  my  State,  for 
March  17,  1855,  in  which  I  find  the  following 
editorial: 

"  NEW  HAMPSHIRE  ELECTION.— An  election  was  held  in 
New  Hampshire,  on  the  13th,  for  Governor,  members  of  the 
Legislature,  Congress,  &.C.,  and,  from  the  returns  already 
received,  there  is  no  doubt  of  the  entire  success  of  the 
American  party. 

"  Of  the  members  of  the  Legislature,  the  Know  Nothings 
have  elected  one  hundred  and  twenty  three,  the  Democrats 
twenty-nine,  and  the  Whigs  three,  so  far  as  heard  from. 
All  the  Know  Nothing  members  of  Congress  are  said  to  be 
elected.  Remember  this  is  Mr.  Pierce's  Slate,  and  may, 
therefore,  be  regarded  as  an  abandonment  of  the  firm  of 
Pierce,  Forney,  Seward,  &  Co.  This  American  victory 
occurred  on  the  same  day  the  Virginia  American  candidate 
was  nominated.  The  former  may  be  taken  as  a  precursor 
of  the  result  of  the  latter." 

The  members  of  this  House  whose  election 
was  thus  greeted  in  a  southern  State,  are  among 
the  most  unwavering  of  the  Free-Soil  majority; 
and  the  next  thing  we  heard  of  that  glorious 
Know  Nothing  Legislature  was,  that  it  had  elect 
ed  JgHN  P.  HALE,  and  another  like  him,  to  the 
United  States  Senate. 

Such  were  the  means  resorted  to  to  blind  the 
people  of  the  South  to  the  appalling  dangers  into 
which  Know  Nbthingism  was  precipitating  the 
country,  and  the  South  in  particular.  Is  not  the 
charge,  made  last  summer,  that  the  triumph  of 


Know  Nothingism  at  the  North  was  the  triumph 
of  Abolitionism,  fully  proven  by  every  test  vote 
yet  taken  in  this  House  ?  And  "  the  end  is  not 
yet."  Day  by  day  the  country  is  being  precip 
itated  towards  revolution  by  the  blind  and  frenzied 
i  Free-Soil  fanaticism  of  the  Know  Nothing  ma- 
I  jority  of  this  House.  Even  now  we  are  threat 
ened  with  a  consummation  of  the  fell  purpose  to 
paralyze  the  Government  of  the  country  by  re- 
|  fusing  supplies  to  carry  it  on,  unless  the  Dem- 
1  ocratic  Senate  and  Democratic  President  will 
permit  this  House  to  dictat3  legislation  incom 
patible  with  the  peace  of  the  country,  if  not 
destructive  of  the  Union.  The  gentleman  from 
Indiana,  [Mr.  DUNN,]  who  stands  at  the  head  of 
the  Fillmore  electoral  ticket  of  his  State,  openly 
proclaims  that  he  will  never  agree  to  appropriate 
a  dollar  to  carry  on  the  Government,  unless  it  is 
coupled  with  the  restoration  of  the  Missouri 
restriction.  It  will  not  be  forgotten  how  boldly 
it  was  denied  last  summer,  and  with  what  assur 
ance  it  was  Declared  by  the  initiated,  that  a  third 
degree  Know  Nothing  could  not  be  an  Aboli 
tionist. 

"  The  order"  having  proved  so  potent  a  lever 
at  the  North  for  raising  into  power  the  broken- 
down  politicians  of  a  defeated  party,  it  was  seized 
on  at  the  South  as  a  means  of  performing  the 
same  office  for  a  large  number  of  aspirants,  who, 
under  every  other  name,  had  been  rejected  by  the 
people  of  that  section.  It  came  silently  and  se 
cretly;  and  until  long  after  its  establishment,  and 
its  lodges  had  been  organized  in  every  county, 
1  and  in  almost  every  neighborhood,  we  were  igno 
rant  of  its  existence  among  us.  I,  myself,  at  the 
moment  it  was  achieving,  and  until  long  after  it 
had  achieved  the  exploits  at  the  North  which 
filled  this  House  with  Abolitionists,  entertained 
no  more  suspicion  of  its  existence  in  our  midst 
than  I  have  at  this  moment  that  Massachusetts 
emigrant  aid  societies  are  established  in  the  city 
of  my  residence.  It  not  only  came  secretly,  but 
it  came  under  the  guise  of  an  association,  no  way 
interfering  in  politics,  except  to  prevent  a  repeti 
tion  of  the  discreditable  scenes  to  which  I  have 
alluded,  as  having  occurred  in  1852.  Its  friends 
professed  to  eschew  all  offices  and  promotion  for 
themselves;  denounced  "  the  wild  hunt  after  of 
fice,  which  characterizes  the  age,"  and  bewailed 
"  the  purer  days  of  the  Republic,  when  office 
sought  the  man,  and  not  man  the  office."  Such 
professions  of  moderation  and  disinterestedness 
disarmed  suspicion.  Thousands  joined  it  who 
withdrew  on  ascertaining  that,  whilst  the  pretext 
was  to  keep  foreigners  and  Roman  Catholics  out 
of  office,  the  real  object  was  to  keep  out  Demo 
crats;  and  that  whilst  ostensibly  declining  all  of 
fices  for  themselves,  their  main  fundamental  prin 
ciple — the  one  which  could  never  be  violated  by 
"  a  brother"  with  impunity — was  a  preference  of 
themselves  and  one  another,  not  only  for  every 
office,  but  for  every  employment  in  the  country. 
The  elections  at  the  North  had  been  carried  on 
extreme  Free-Soil  principles,  as  I  have  shown. 
They  had  taken  place  in  the  fall  of  1854.  Tha 
elections  at  the  South  were  to  come  on  in  the 
summer  of  1855.  The  northern  Know  Nothings 
had  had  a  "  good  time  of  it"  in  1854,  running  on 
an  extreme  Free-Soil  platform;  and  the  southern 
Know  Nothings  claimed,  and  had  accorded  to 
them,  a  platform  that  it  was  thought  would  give 


them  an  equally  "  good  time  of  it"  in  1855.  As 
no  elections  were  pending  at  the  North,  the  thing 
was  easily  arranged;  and  in  June,  1855,  the  Phil 
adelphia  convention  passed  a  set  of  resolutions 
embracing,  among  others,  the  celebrated  twelfth 
section.  I,  for  one,  made  no  issue  on  that 
twelfth  section.  I  told  the  people  that  if  it  was  ; 
the  doctrine  of  the  party,  and  the  party  would  ' 
abide  by  it,  and  we  could  be  so  assured,  they 
might  be  safely  trusted,  as  far  as  the  slavery 
question  was  concerned.  But  I  told  them  it  was 
not  the  doctrine  of  the  party — that  it  was  only 
put  forth  to  affect  the  southern  elections;  and  as 
soon  as  they  were  over  it  would  be  repealed,  as 
it  had  already  been  repudiated  by  the  whole 
northern  wing  of  the  party.  That,  like  every 
thing  else  militating  against  their  success,  was 
broadly  and  boldly  contradicted. 

As  soon  as  the  southern  elections  were  over, 
the  newspaper  organ  of  the  party  in  this  city 
commenced  to  agitate  in  favor  of  striking  out  the 
twelfth  section.  A  feeble  echo  came  from  the 
county  town  of  one  of  the  most  patriotic  counties 
in  the  district  I  have  the  honor  to  represent. 
From  every  part  of  the  country,  in  a  few  in 
stances  even  in  those  portions  of  the  South  in 
which  "an  intensely  American  feeling"  pre 
vailed,  the  cry  was  taken  up.  The  national 
Know  Nothing  council  met  at  Philadelphia  in 
February,  1856.  The  North  demanded  the  re 
peal.  Mr.  Sheets,  of  Indiana,  said: 

"  He  would  assure  the  South,  that  the  twelfth  section 
must  be  got  rid  of.  He  was  willing  to  accept  a  compro 
mise,  but  the  section  must  be  got  rid  of.  He  was  willing  to 
accept  the  Washington  platform,  for,  if  there  was  any 
thing  in  it,  it  was  so  covered  up  with  verbiage  that  a  Presi 
dent  would  be  elected  before  the  people  would  find  out 
what  it  was* all  about.  [Tumultuous  laughter.]  Three 
southern  States  had  been  carried  on  the  twelfth  section. 
Repeal  it,  and  we  will  give  you  the  entire  North.  [Ap 
plause."] 

The  twelfth  section  was  stricken  out  against 
the  unanimous  vote  of  the  South,  and  the  "ver 
biage"  platform  alluded  to  by  Mr.  Sheets  was 
adopted .  Thereupon  a  large  portion  of  the  south 
ern  members  seceded  from  the  convention.  They 
say  now  the  verbiage  platform  is  as  good  as  the 
twelfth  section.  Then  why  did  they  secede  when  it  ivas 
adopted  ?  After  Mr.  Fillmore  was  nominated,  or 
rather  when  they  saw  that  by  returning  they  could 
effect  that  much-desired  object,  they  returned  to 
the  convention,  and  Mr.  Fillmore  was  nominated. 
Then  it  became  the  turn  of  the  northern  members 
to  bolt,  and  they  went  off,  carrying  very  nearl 
all  the  presidential  strength  of  the  party.  Sue 


I 


by  the  Black  Republican  convention,  and  spurned 
from  their  doors,  have  tamely  fallen  into  the  ranks 
of  Fremont,  and  will  no  doubt  labor  the  harder 
for  the  kicks  they  have  received.  Hear  what 
Ford,  one  of  the  leading  seceders  from  the  Phila 
delphia  Know  Nothing  convention,  said  when 
admitted  to  the  Black  Republican  convention: 

"  The  American  party  has  a  great  work  to  do,  and  that 
work  is  to  spread  Americanism  and  resist  slavery.  [Ap 
plause.]  The  power  of  the  Pope  and  domestic  slavery  are 
linked  together,  [applause,]  and  they  have  upon  earth  hut 
one  mission— the  extinction  of  human  liberty.  The  power 
of  oppression  is  the  same,  whether  it  be  foreign  or  domestic. 
Can  we  not  combine  for  the  overthrow  of  these  powers  of 
darkness?  [Applause.]  Is  it  possible  that  the  people  of  the 
North  cannot  unite  for  the  overthrow  of  that  hydra-headed 
monster — Popery  and  slavery?  [Applause.]  I  tell  you  that 
we  can.  [Great  applause.]  I  tell  you  we  will  unite.  [Up 
roarious  cheering.]  Let  us  inscribe  upon  our  banners,  arid 
proclaim  it  to  the  enemies  of  liberty  everywhere,  that  th« 
American  party  was  the  first  which  proclaimed  the  princi 
ples  of  freedom — [tremendous  applause] — the  first,  any 
where,  to  hold  that  it  has  inalienable  rights,  among  which 
are  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness.  The  Whig 
party  has  bidden  high  for  southern  support.  The  Democrats 
have  made  bids  for  it.  Every  other  party  has  bidden  for  it, 
till  the  American  party  sprang  up.  That  party  has  said  to 
the  South,  "  We  can  no  longer  serve  you  :"  and  it  wae  the 
first  party  that  ever  said  this  thing.  [Applause.]" 

This  is  the  same  individual  who  figured  con 
spicuously  in  the  Know  Nothing  convention  of 
June,  1855,  and  who  entertained  and  proclaimed 
there  the  same  sentiments.  After  having  been 
called  to  the  confessional  by  Mr.  Ford,  in  that 
convention,  in  regard  to  the  repeal  of  the  Mis 
souri  restriction,  southern  gentlemen  returned 
home,  and  proclaimed  to  my  people  that  the 
Know  Nothing  party  of  the  North  was  sound, 
reliable,  and  patriotic. 

Thus  ended,  as  predicted  it  would  end,  the  at 
tempt  to  form  a  national  Know  Nothing  party. 
|  The  Democratic  party  is  the  only  party  in  the 
|  country  standing  upon  the  Constitution,  and 
maintaining  all  its  provisions,  regardless  of  sec 
tions  or  of  sectional  prejudices.  It  has  existed 
since  the  foundation  of  the  Government,  main 
taining  itself  through  all  the  mutations  of  parties, 
of  men,  and  of  political  issues.  To  say  that  it 
has  occasionally  done  wrong  is  only  to  attribute 
to  it  the  character  which  the  Almighty  has  stamped 
on  all  his  works.  Nothing  is  infallible  but  the 
all- wise  and  unseen  God.  I  claim  not  for  ths 
Democratic  party  any  greater  perfection  than 
belongs  to  the  fallible  men  of  whom  it  is  composed. 
But  it  has  always  maintained  its  strength  equally 
over  the  whole  Union,  because  its  principles  have 
always  been  the  principles  of  the  Constitution, 
which  was  intended  to  guard,  and  protect,  and 


is  the  great  and  harmonious  national  party  which  i  j  foster  the  whole  Union  alike.     Whatever  party- 
is  to  save  the  Union  from  sectional  strife.    Unable  !  |  undertakes  to  supplant  it  must  necessarily  become 


to  save  itself  from  strife  and  dissolution  through 
forty-eight  hours — its  whole  history  is  but  a  long 
tale  of  bolters  and  seceders,  sub-bolters  and  new 
aeceders.  It  affects  to  be  national,  and  claims  that 
in  its  embrace  the  Union  would  be  secure.  Their 
embrace  must  be  more  powerful  than  the  feeble 
and  relaxed  ligaments  that  bind  together  the 
members  of  their  own  body.  As  well  might  the 


J  sectional,  or  one-ideaed,  because  it  already  occu 
pies  all  the  ground  the  Constitution  affords  for 
any  party  to  stand  on.  The  Know  Nothing 

J  party  has  only  suffered  the  fate  of  all  its  prede 
cessors;  and  it  has  only  met  its  fate  more  sud 
denly  and  more  disastrously  than  its  predeces- 

I  sors,  because  it  started  as  a  sectional  party,  whilst 

|  all  others  have  started  as  national,  and  have  only 


unhappy  parents  who  wrangle  and  fight  at  every  !   become  sectional  after  long  years  of  defeat  and 
meeting  around  the  domestic  board,  claim  that !   disappointment, 
they  are  teaching  their  children  fraternal  harmony 


and  concord.     Their  example  is  more  potent  for 
evil  than  their  precepts  for  good. 

The  northern  members  who  bolted  when  Fill- 
more  was  nominated,  after  having  been  insulted 


In  the  disastrous  wreck  at  Philadelphia,  in 
February  last,  the  southern  Know  Nothings 
clung  to  the  platform,  (though  they  had  bortted 
when  it  was  adopted,)  and  floated  off,  with  Mr. 
Fillmore  for  pilot,  and  a  few  northern  friends  of 


10 


Mr.  Fillmore  for  companions  in  misfortune.  I 
propose  to  examine  that  platform  only  so  far  as 
to  see  whether  it  contains  anything  so  important 
or  so  urgent  as  to  require  or  justify  the  division 
of  the  South  at  this  most  fearful  juncture. 

1.  The  first  object  is,  that  "Americans  shall 
rule  America."  No  one  objects  to  that.  Amer 
icans  have  always  ruled  America,  ever  since  our 
forefathers  declared  their  independence  of  the 
British  crown.  The  great  body  of  the  people 
rule  America.  They  are  Americans,  (not  Know 
Nothings,)  having  American  principles,  Ameri 
can  ideas,  and  American  interests.  So  long  as  the 
people  rule,  "Americans  will  rule  America."  If, 
however,  it  is  meant  to  say,  that  a  few  foreign- 
born  citizens  holding  office  is  incompatible  with 
this  great  principle,  I  deny  it.  It  is  a  great  mis 
take  for  a  few  office-holders  or  office-seekers  to 
suppose  that  office-holders  rule  this  country.  If 
that  was  the  case,  the  Government  would  have 
ceased  to  be  the  popular  Government  our  fore 
fathers  established,  and  it  would  be  time  for 
another  revolution.  I  know  that  the  little  bust 
ling  politicians  who  are  always  after  office,  and 
who  think  that  "  thou  shalt  not  hold  office"  is  the 
direst  punishment  that  can  be  denounced  against  a 
citizen,  flatter  themselves  that  when  they  get  into 
office  they  will  rule  the  country.  But  theirs  is  a 
great  error.  The  first  appointment  ever  made  by 
General  Washington  to  his  Cabinet  was  of  Alexan 
der  Hamilton,  a  foreigner  by  birth,  to  be  Secreta 
ry  of  the  Treasury.  One  of  the  first  appointments 
he  made  to  the  bench  of  the  Supreme  Court  was 
of  James  Wilson,  a  foreigner  by  birth.  The 
first  appointment  made  by  Mr.  Jefferson  was  of 
Albert  Gallatm  to  be  Secretary  of  the  Treasury. 
Every  Administration  from  that  day  to  this  has 
appointed  foreigners,  and  nobody  has  ever  found 
out,  until  Know  Nothingism  sprung  up,  that 
Americans  were  not  ruling  America.  If,  when 


we  were  only  five  millions  strong,  General  Wash 
Mr.  Jefferson  did  not  fear  to  appoint 
them  to  the  highest  places,  we  need  not  fear  to 


ington  and 


give  them  a  few  small  offices,  now  that  we  are 
Twenty-five  millions  strong. 

2.  The  denial  to  all  foreigners  of  the  right  to 
.be  naturalized,  as  heretofore,  in  five  years;  or, 
what  is  a  practical  denial,  the  extension  of  the 
probation  period  from  five  to  twenty-one  years. 

They  do  not  propose  to  exclude  foreigners  from 
the  country,  but  to  admit  them,  (the  old  platform 
promised  them  protection  and  a  friendly  welcome, 
and  Mr.  Fillmore,  in  one  of  his  recent  speeches, 
has  repeated  its  languge;)  and  when  they  get 
here,  to  place  them  on  a  level,  socially  and  po 
litically,  with  free  negroes.  If  foreigners  are 
pouring  into  the  country  as  rapidly  as  the  Know 
Nothings  represent,  we  would,  under  the  opera 
tion  of  this  rule,  have  among  us,  in  a  few  years, 
several  millions  of  white  men,  of  the  same  color 
with  ourselves,  possessing  equal  intelligence, 
equal  pride,  and  equal  sensibility  with  ourselves, 
and  yet  degraded  by  the  laws  to  the  level  of  the 
free  negro.  Who  would  tolerate  a  proposition 
to  admit  among  us  Such  a  number  of  free  negroes  ? 
Not  one.  Yet  it  is  proposed  to  make  of  all  that 
number  of  foreigners  the  most  bitter  and  implac 
able  foes  to  us  and  our  institutions.  The  free 
negro  is  not  our  enemy,  because,  conscious  of 
the  inferiority  of  his  race,  he  aspires  not  to  equal 
ity.  But  the  unnaturalized  foreigner  would  be  a 


U  most  formidable  and  vindictive  enemy,  because 

i  smarting  under    the   sting   of  degradation   and 

insult.      Civil   war,   riots,   bloodshed    in   every 

shape,  revolution,   and   social   disorder,   would 

necessarily  follow  from  such  a  policy.     If  they 

I,  are  not  to  be  made  citizens  of,  and  amalgamated 

i|  with  us,  keep  them  out  of  the  country.    Arm  your 

1 1  forts,  and  man  your  ships,  and  drive  them  from 

our  coasts  as  vou  would  an  army  of  invaders. 

3.  The  repeal  of  all  laws  making  grants  of'lands 
to  foreigners. 

I  know  of  but  one  law  making  grants  of  lands 
to  foreigners.  That  was  an  act  passed  27th  of 
September,  1850,  "  to  make  donations  to  settlers 
on  the  public  lands  in  Oregon."  It  was  signed  by 
•Mr.  Fillmore)  as  President,  and  without  his  approval 
could  not  have  become  a  law.  It  is  as  follows: 

"  SEC.  4.  That  there  shall  be,  and  hereby  is,  granted  to 
every  white  settler,  or  occupant  of  the  public  lands — Amer 
ican  half-breed  Indians  included — above  the  age  of  eighteen 
years,  being  a  citizen  of  the  United  States,  or  having  made 
a  declaration,  according  to  law,  of  his  intention  to  become  a 
j  i  citizen,  or  who  shall  make  such  a  declaration  on  or  before  the 
\\  1st  day  of  December,  1851,  now  residing  in  said  Territory, 
II  or  who  shall  become  a  resident  thereof  on  or  before  the  1st 
day  of  December,  1850,  and  who  shall  have  resided  upon, 
and  cultivated  the  same,  for  four  successive  years,  and 
shall  otherwise  conform  to  the  provisions  of  this  act,  the 
quantity  of  one  half-section,  or  three  hundred  and  twenty 
acres,  of  land,  if  a  single  man  ;  and  if  a  married  man,  or 
shall  become  married  within  one  year  from  December  1, 
'  1850,  one  section,  or  six  hundred  and  forty  acres — half  to 
I  himself,  and  half  to  his  wife." — Statutes  at  Large,  vol.  9, 
I  p.  497. 

That  law  ought  to  be  repealed.  It  ought  never 
I  to  have  been  passed.  I  condemn  Mr.  Fillmore 
j  for  approving  it.  But  what  is  to  be  thought  of  a 
!  party  that  attributes  to  others  as  a  crime  the  act 
j  of  its  own  candidate  ? 

4.  The  thirteenth  article  of  the  platform  is  a 
'  general  indictment  against  the  administration  of 

General  Pierce,  containing  many  counts. 

The  first  count  is  for  removing  Know  Nothings 

I  from  office.     Every  Know  Nothing  is,  or  was, 

required,  on  initiation,  to  take  an  oath,  as  follows: 

|  "  That  you  will  not  vote,  nor  give  your  influence, 

i  for  any  man  for  any  office  in  the  gift  of  the  people, 

unless  he  be  an  American-born  citizen,  in  favor 

of  Americans  ruling  America;"  that  is,  unless  he 

is  a  Know  Nothing,  "  nor  if    he  be  a  Roman 

Catholic;"  and   "that  you  will   support  in  all 

political  matters,  for  all  political  offices,  members 

of  this  order  in  preference  to  others."     Having 

j  sworn  to  proscribe  everybody  differing  from  him 

in  opinion,  what  right  has  the  Know  Nothing  to 

|  complain  if  those  differing   from  him  proscribe 

j  him  ? 

Again  he  swears:  "  That  you  will,  in  all  polit- 
!  ical  matters,  so  far  as  this  Order  is  concerned, 
!  comply  with  the  will  of  the  majority,  though  it 
may  conflict  with  your  personal   preferences;" 
I  that  is,  that  he  will  submit  himself  implicitly  to 
1  the  will  of  "  the  Order,"  and  vote  as  it  directs 
j  him.  If  the  Know  Nothing  is  right  in  proscribing 
i  the  Roman  Catholic,  because  he  owes  obedience 
I  to  the  Pope  in  religious  matters,  the  Democrats 
i  are  certainly  right  to  proscribe  the  Know  Noth 
ing  who  has  yielded  up  his  freedom  of  judgment, 
and  owes  obedience  to  "  the  council"  in  political 
matters. 

Again  he  swears:  "That  if  it  maybe  done 
legally,  you  will,  when  elected  or  appointed  to 
any  official  station,  conferring  on  you  the  power 
to  do  so,  remove  all  foreigners,  aliens,  or  Roman 


11 


Catholics  (though  they  m%  be  native-born) 
from  office  or  place." 

Now,  sir,  I  have  never  been  a  great  admirer  of 
the  spoils  system,  as  practiced  by  all  parties  to  a 
certain  extent,  and  by  none  to  half  the  extent 
that  the  Know  Nothings  carry  it — the  practice  of 
turning  everybody  differing  from  us  out  of  office; 
but  I  do  hold  that  no  man  who  has  taken  this 
oath  ought  to  be  continued  in  office  one  moment, 
and  allowed  to  turn  out  to  starve,  perhaps  better 
men  than  himself,  merely  because  they  profess 
an  unpopular  religious  faith,  whilst  perhaps  he 
himself  has  no.  religion  at  all. 

The  second  count  is  on  "a  truckling  subserv 
iency  to  the  stronger,  and  an  insolent  and  cow 
ardly  bravado  towards  the  weaker  powers. "  The 
language  in  which  this  count  is  couched  must 
have  been  borrowed  from  Major  Donelson's 
editorials  against  Mr.  Fillmore,  when  the  latter 
was  making  (no doubt  honest)  efforts  to  suppress 
filibustering  against  the  island  of  Cuba.  "  Truck 
ling  subserviency  to  Spanish  despotism"  was  the 
sort  of  phrases  in  which  he  daily  indulged.  T 
may  safely  leave  the  brilliant  conduct  of  our  rela 
tions  with  England,  the  unanimous  commenda 
tion  bestowed  on  it  by  Senators,  presses,  and 
private  individuals  of  all  parties,  and  the  suc 
cessful  and  highly  honorable  settlement  of  our 
differences  with  that  "  stronger  Power, "to  refute 
the  first  charge.  And  I  challenge  the  production 
of  one  instance  of  "insolent  and  cowardly  bra 
vado  towards  the  weaker  Powers."  It  is  not 
true.  Never  have  our  foreign  relations  been  on 
a  better  footing  than  they  are  at  this  moment. 

The  third  count  is  on  the  "  reckless  and  unwise 
policy  of  the  Administration,"  "  as  shown  in  the 
repeal  of  the  Missouri  compromise."  For  the 
sake  of  comparison,  I  here  present  the  preamble 
to  the  Black  Republican  platform,  of  June  17, 
1856: 

"Mr.  Wilmot  then  submitted  the  following  report : 
"  The  Platform. — This  convention  of  delegate*,  assem 
bled  in  pursuance  of  a  call  addressed  to  the  people  of  the 
United  States,  without  regard  to  past  political  differences  or 
divisions,  who  are  opposed  to  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri 
compromise,  to  the  policy  of  the  present  Administration,  to 
the  extension  of  slavery  into  free  Territory,  in  favor  of  the 
admission  of  Kansas  as  a  free  State,  of  restoring  the  action 
of  the  Federal  Government  to  the  principles  of  Washing 
ton  and  JollVrsmi,  and  for  the  purpose  of  presenting  candi 
dates  for  the  offices  of  President  and  Vice  President,"  &c. 

What  difference  is  there  between  the  two? 
The  Know  Nothing  platform  says  it  ought  not  to 
have  been  repealed,  but  says  nothing  about  the 
restoration  of  it.  The  Black  Republican  says  it 
ought  not  to  have  been  repealed,  and  says  nothing 
about  its  restoration.  This  is  the  great  and  vital 
question  which  is  agitating  the  country,  and 
threatening  to  snap  asunder  the  bonds  of  the 
Union.  I  ask  again,  wherein  do  the  Know  Noth 
ings  on  this  subject  differ  from  the  B,lack  Repub 
licans?  Can  the  Know  Nothings,  if  they  get 
into  power,  any  more  refuse  to  restore  it  than 
the  Black  Republicans :  Both  say  it  ought  not  to 
have  been  repealed. 

At  a  ratification  meeting  of  the  friends  of  Fill- 
more,  just  held  in  New  York,  at  which  several 
southern  gentlemen,  members  of  this  House, 
were  present,  and  addressed  the  people,  Mr. 
Ketchum,  one  of  the  most  influential  of  the  per 


sonal  and  political  friends  of  Mr.  Fillmore,  spoke 
as  follows:* 

If  either  gets  into  power,  the  Missouri  restric 
tion  will,  in  my  opinion,  be  restored.     It  cannot 
be  otherwise;  and  I  leave  to  others  to  penetrate 
the  future,  and  tell  us  the  consequences.     Some 
of  Mr.  Fillmore '.s  friends — the  gentleman  from 
Indiana,  [Mr.  DUNK,]  for  instance— say  it  shall 
be  restored,  and  refuse  to  vote  a  dollar  to  carry 
on  the  Government  until  the  refractory  Senate 
and  President  yield  their  consent.     Others  of  his 
friends  desire  its  restoration,  but  seeing  no  pos 
sibility  of  bringing  the  Senate  to  terms,  are  op 
posed  to  agitating  it  during  this  Congress.     The 
southern  friends  of  Mr.  Fillmore,  who  stand  on 
this  platform,  admit  that  the  Missouri  compro 
mise  was  unjust  and  unconstitutional,  and  ought 
never  to  have  been  enacted,  but  seem  to  object  to 
I  the  repeal,  because  it  "  reopened  sectional  agita- 
Ition."      Does  it  never  occur  to  such,  that  the 
!  surest  possible  mode  which  they  could  adopt  to 
I  keep  up  and  perpetuate  that  sectional  agitation  is 
|  to  denounce  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill  as  a 
i  great  wrong,  and  yet  refuse  to  aid  in«ts  repeal? 
!  Can  they  expect  the  agitation  ever  to  cease  so 
:  long  as  they  continue   to  occupy  that  position? 
|  A  bad  law  may  inflict  on  the  country  less  injury 
than  a  long  and  angry  agitation  for  its  repeal; 
and  if  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill  were  as  bad 
as  they  represent  it,  they  can  never  be  justified 
!  in  contributing  to  keep  alive  the  strife  which  pre- 
|  vails  in  the  country.     But  it  is  not  a  bad  law.     It 
[i  was  a  great  measure  of  justice  and  right.     It  was 
j !  but  the  long  deferred  payment  of  a  great  debt  due 
to  the  Constitution  of  the  country. 

*  "  Since  the  speech  was  delivered,  the  House  of  Repre 
sentatives,  on  motion  of  Mr.  DUNN,  of  Indiana,  who  is  at 
the  head  of  the  Fillmore  electoral  ticket  of  the  State,  has 
passed  a  bill  restoring  the  Missouri  compromise — Mr.  HA 
VEN,  of  New  York,  the  law  partner  and  friend  of  Mr.  Fill- 
j  more,  voting  for  it." 

What  was  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill,  that  it 
should  be  thus  denounced  ?  The  Missouri  restric 
tion  had  always  been  regarded,  by  many  able 
statesmen  of  both  sections,  as  a  violation  of  the 


"As  regards  the  question  of  slavery,  Fillmore  will  sup 
port  the  old  compromises  to  which  the  faith  of  all  sections 
of  the  country  was  pledged.  If  he  had  been  in  the  pres 
idential  chair  when  the  Kansas  Nebraska  bill  was  passed, 
he  would  have  vetoed  it.  And,  gentlemen,  why  do  the 
Republicans  oppose  him  ?  Simply  because  he  is  an  honest 
man.  [Cheers.]  *  .*  i 

"  Fillmore  is  censured  because  he  signed  the  fugitive 
slave  law;  but  he  could  not  do  otherwise,  elected,  as  he 
was,  by  the  Whigs,  whose  principles  are  opposed  to  the 
exercise  of  the  veto  power.  He  examined  the  law  fully. 
He  may  not  have  considered  it  the  best  law  that  could  have 
been  made  ;  but  it  was  his  duty,  as  President  and  a  Whig, 
to  consider  whether  it  was  constitutional  or  not.  He  re 
ferred  it  to  the  Attorney  General,  John  J.  Crittenden,  to 
see  if  it  was  constitutional,  and  he  dfdared  that  it  was 
constitutional,  and  proved  it  in  a  very  able  and  clear  report. 
It  was  then  referred  to  the  Cabinet,  and  they  unanimously 
decided  it  to  be  constitutional.  Now,  I  a~k  the  Republican 
party  what  Millard  Fillmore  could  have  done  but  sign  the 
bill— advised  by  his  Cabinet  to  do  so  — us  constitutionality 
having  been  proved?  I  say,  if  he  had  not  signed  it,  he 
would  have  deserved  impeachment.  [Loud  cheers.]  This 
is  the  only  objection  the  Republican  party  dare  to  bring  for 
ward  against  Fillmore.  The  man  who  was  horn  amongua, 
who  is  bone  of  our  bone,  and  come  from  the  very  loins  of 
free  labor,  shall  we  give  him  up  for  Fremont?  Shall  we 
make  Fremont  the  standard  bearer  or  freedom  ?  [Voices. 
1  No,  no,'  '  Black  Republicans.'  Tlimi  groans  were  given 
for  Fremont.  1" 


12 


Constitution.  The  South  had  felt  it  as  an  odious 
badge  of  her  inferiority  in  the  Union,  and  a  stig 
ma  upon  her  domestic  institutions.  Those  at 
the  North,  the  whole  of  whose  political  princi 
ples  consisted  of  a  malignant  warfare  upon  the 
southern  section,  had  never  regarded  it  in  prac 
tice,  had  repudiated  and  spit  upon  it  from  the  day  ' 
of  its  adoption,  down  to  1850,  and  had  never 
valued  it  except  as  a  stinging  reproach  to  the 
South,  to  be  perpetuated  in  the  statute-book,  only 
for  the  gratification  of  sectional  malignity.  A 
large  and  patriotic  party  at  the  North,  (the  Dem 
ocratic  party,)  though  believing  it  to  have  been 
unconstitutional  and  unjust,  yet,  with  the  South, 
labored  for  its  enforcement  whilst  it  was  on  the 
statute-book,  and  with  us  voted  for  its  extension 
to  our  acquisitions  from 'Mexico.  They  (the 
whole  South  and  the  Democratic  party  of  the 
North)  failed  in  their  efforts,  and  it  was  repeatedly 
rejected  and  repudiated  on  direct  votes  in  Con 
gress.  Even  the  Nashville  convention,  which 
was  denounced  as  a  treasonable  conspiracy  against 
the  Union,  demanded  nothing:  but  the  application 


pealed  by  the  con^Dromise  of  1850,  and  the  Kan 
sas  and  Nebraska  bill  simply  declared  the  fact 
that  it  had  been  repealed,  and  excepted  it  out 
of  the  clause  of  the  bill  extending  the  constitution 
and  laws  of  the  United  States  over  the  new  Ter 
ritories.  •  Congress  could  not  have  extended  the 
Missouri  compromise  over  these  Territories,  con 
sistently  with  the  pledges  all  parties  had  given  to 
abide  by  the  compromise  of  1850.  The-- Kansas 
and  Nebraska  bill  may  have  asserted  a  falsehood 
when  it  declared  the  Missouri  compromise  incon 
sistent  with  the  legislation  of  1850.  But  it  is  not 
competent  for  the  present  Know  Nothing  leaders 
to  say  so,  for  they  told  us  the  same  thing  in  1850, 
and  in  1854  they  advocated  the  bill  which  their 
present  platform  denounces.  More  than  that; 
whilst  the  bill  was  pending  in  1854,  they  taunted 
a  certain  portion  of  the  Democratic  party  of  the 
South,  and  took  great  credit  to  themselves  for 
having  driven  those  impracticable  Democrats — 
"  secessionists,"  they  called  them— to  acknowl 
edge  that  the  compromise  of  1850  did  repeal  the 
Missouri  compromise.  Jf  time  permitted,  I  could 
present  some  specimens  of  oratory  of  this  sort: 
It  is  a  singular  fact,  Mr.  Chairman,  that  whilst 
the  Black  Republicans  who  denounce  the  repeal 


of  its  prrticinles  to  the  new  Territories. 

Thus  stood  the  Missouri  compromise  at  the 
commencement  of  the  memorable  session  of  Con 
gress  of  1850.  The  friends  of  the  Union  and  the  ;j  of  the  Missouri  compromise  are  persons  who 
Constitution  wished  a  settlement  on  the  princi-  M  had  passed  their  whole  lives  in  opposing,  deriding, 
pies  of  that  compromise;  the  enemies  of  the  '  and  spurning  it,  so  almost  all  those  who  stand 
Constitution,  and  contemners  of  a  constitutional;!  upon  this  Know  Nothing  platform  now,  denounc- 
union  of  equal  States,  refused  to  accede  to  such  a'|  ing  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill,  are  'persons 
settlement.  |j  who  advocated,  and  such  of  them  as  were  in  Con- 

During  the  session  of  1850,  the  compromise  !'  gress  voted  for,  that  bill  when  it  was  pending  in 
measures  were  passed.  Many  in  the  South  op-  j  1854,  every  southern  member  of  the  Senate  but 
posed  that  settlement  on  the  allegation  that  their  'j  two,  and  every  southern  member  of  this  House 
section  was  called  on  to  yield  everything,  and  to  '  but  nine,  having  voted  for  it.  It  found  no  more 
receive  no  substantial  concession.  The  whole  ;j  able  or  zealous  defender  in  either  House  than  the 
South,  as  WQ  all  remember,  was  agitated  on  the  distinguished  Senator  from  my  own  State,  [Mr. 
subject.  The  present  leader  of  the  Know  Nothing  !  BADGER,]  who  distinctly  declared  that  it  was  de- 
party,  standing  now  on  a  platform  denouncing  the  manded  by  the  compromise  of  1850. 
repeal  of  the  "Missouri  compromise,  contended  j  On  the  26th  of  January,  1856,  the  honorable 
then  that  the  compromise  measures  repealed  the  '  gentleman  from  Vermont  [Mr.  MEACHAM]  sub- 


odious  Missouri  compromise,  and  that  that  was 
substantial  concession  to  our  section.  One  of  my 
predecessors  on  this  floor,  having  opposed  the 
compromise  of  1850,  was  denounced  for  it  at 
home  on  that  ground,  by  leading  members  of  the 
present  Know  Nothing  party  of  the  district. 
At  the  next  presidential  election,  in  1852,  both 


mitted  to  this  House  the  following  resolution: 

"  Resolved.  That,  in  the  opinion  of  this  House,  the  repeal 
of  the  Missouri  compromise  of  1820,  prohibiting  slavery 
north  of  latitude  36°  30',  was  an  example  of  useless  and 
factious  agitation  of  the  slavery  question,  unwise  and  un 
just  to  the  American  people." 


,  ,  This  resolution  was  passed  by  a  vote  of  108  to 

the  great  parties  of  the  country  agreed   to  make     93,  every  Black  Republican  and  every  northern 
the  compromise  of  1850  "a  finality."     At  that  ;  friend  of  Mr.  FiUmore,  except  two,  voting  for  it; 

1,.  A>-v  IT-*-  J  -n  •    i  ____  ]_-  __      T^  ,  __  ,       -  !,  „       IT  ____  ___  :..!_ 


election,  General  Pierce  was  chosen  President, 
and  came  into  office  with  a  distinct  pledge  to  re 
gard  the  compromise  of  1850  as  "a  finality, "and 
to  carry  out  its  provisions.  Durinn;  his  term,  in 
1854,  it  became  necessary  to  establish  territorial 
governments  in  Kansas  and  Nebraska.  In  the 
bill  providing  those  governments,  it  was  declared, 
in  section  thirty-two,  as  follows: 

"  That  the  Constitution,  and  all  tho  laws  of  the  United 
States  which  are  not  locally  inapplicable,  shall  have  the 
same  force  and  effect  within  the  Kiid  Territory  of  Kansas  as 
elsewhere  within  the  United  States,  except  the  eighth  sec 
tion  of  the  act  preparatory  to  t.he  admission  of  Missouri  info 
the  Union,  approved  March  6,  1820,  which,  heing  incon 
sistent  with  the  principle  of  non^iiiU'rvention  by  Congress 
with  slavery  in  the  States  and  Territories,  as  recognised 
by  the  legislation  of  18,~>0,  commonly  called  the  compromise 
measures,  is  hereby  declared  inoperative  and  void." 


and  every  Democrat  in  the  House,  with  every 
southern  friend  of  Mr.  Fillmors,  except  one, 
voting  against  it.  It  seems  from  this  vote  that 
the  southern  Know  Nothings  then  thought  the 
repeal  of  the  Missouri  compromise  neither  "un 
wise,"  "unjust,"  nor  "  injurious."  Yet,  in  less 
than  one  month  thereafter,  the  National  Council 
denounces  the  Democratic  Administration  for  the 
passage  of  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill,  and 
these  same  southern  Know  Nothings  are  heard 


sinking  hosannas  to  the  platform. 

The  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill  perpetrated  no 
wrong.     If  the  repeal  of  the*  Missouri  compro 
mise  was  a  wrong,  the  wrong  was  perpetrated  by 
the  compromise  of  1850,  signed  <ind  approved  by 
Mr.  Fillmore,  and  constituting  the  main  ground 
on  which  his  friends  claim  for  him  the  confidence 
It  was  not  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill  that  !  and  support  of  the  South.     It  was  no  sectional 
repealed  the  Missouri  compromise;  it  was  re- jj  measure;  it  was  a  tribute  to  the  Constitution,  a 


13 


pledge  of  peace,  an  offering  to  the  great  principle 
that  the  people  are  capable  of  self-government, 
and  entitled  to  manage  their  own  affairs  in  such 
manner  as  they  deem  best.  But  if  it  was  a 
wrong,  it  was  a  wrong  in  favor  of  the  South,  and 
that  section,  at  least,  cannot  complain  of  the  in 
jury. 

It  is  further  objected  to  the  Kansas  and  Ne 
braska  bill,  that  it  establishes  over  those  Terri 
tories  what  is  called  "squatter  sovereignty." 
That  phrase,  in  connection  with  the  politics  of 
the  country,  originated  from  the  admission  of 
California  into  the  Union.  The  people  of  that 
State,  shortly  after  its  acquisition  from  Mexico, 
in  advance  of  the  establishment  of  any  govern 
ment  by  Congress,  and  without  its  authority  or 
consent,  assumed  to  organize  a  government  for 
themselves,  formed  a  constitution,  and  applied 
for  admission  into  the  Union.  This  unauthorized 
assumption  of  sovereign  power  by  the  squatters  on 
the  public  land  was  denominated  squatter  sover 
eignty.  It  is  the  only  instance  in  our  history  in 
which  such  a  thing  has  been  done  or  attempted. 
The  "  squatter  sovereignty  "  was  recognized,  and 
the  State  thus  formed  was  admitted  into  the 
Union  by  an  act  of  Congress  signed  and  approved 
by  J\Ir.  Fillmore.  In  the  case  of  Kansas  and  Ne 
braska,  no  such  thing  has  been  done  or  attempted, 
and,  as  in  most  of  the  other  counts  of  their  in 
dictment,  they  charge  against  us  what  their  can 
didate  has  done. 

But  it  is  said  the  bill  allows  the  people  resident 
there  to  prohibit  the  introduction  of  slavery  be 
fore  their  admission  into  the  Union.  It  contains 
no  such  feature.  The  thirty-second  section  de 
clares  its  intent  to  be  "  to  leave  the  people  thereof 
perfectly  free  to  form  and  regulate  their  domestic 
institutions  in  their  own  way,  subject  only  to  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States."  If  the  Con 
stitution  allows  them  to  prohibit  slavery,  then 
the  bill  permits  it:  if  the  Constitution  does  not 
allow  them  to  prohibit  slavery,  then  the  bill  does 
not  permit  it.  The  power  of  the  people  during 
the  existence  of  their  territorial  government  is 
a  judicial  question  to  be  settled  by  the  courts,  if 
a  case  should  ever  arise  involving  the  question  ; 
and  whatever  Congress  might  have  said  in  the 
bill  it  could  not  have  altered  the  Constitution, 
nor  taken  the  question  out  of  the  hands  of  the 
courts.  Whatever  may  be  the  decision  of  the 
courts,  I  will  be  content;  for  I  regard  the  great 
main  feature- of  the  bill  as  infinitely  transcending 
in  importance  any  of  the  minor  questions  that 
can  be  raised  under  it.  And  I  would  rather  trust 
the  question  to  the  people  of  the  Territory  than 
to  such  a  Congress  as  we  now  have,  and  are 
liable  to  have  at  any  time  in  the  future. 

The  next  specification  in  the  indictment  is,  that 
unnaturalized  foreigners  were  allowed  to  vote  at 
the  first  election  in  Kansas  and  Nebraska. 

I  do  not  approve  such  a  provision,  and  would 
not  vote  for  it,  unless  compelled  to  take  it  in  order 
to  get  what  I  regarded  a  good  provision  of  greater 
importance.  I  certainly  would  not  have  voted 
against  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill  on  account 
of  it.  When  the  Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill  was 
introduced,  it  encountered  the  most  violent  oppo 
sition  from  theTree-Soilers  and  Abolitionists — the- 
enemies  of  the  compromise  of  1850 — because  it 
proposed  to  carry  out  the  provisions  of  that  com 
promise.  It  was  important,  in  order  that  a  fair 


issue  might  be  presented  betweenthose  who  were 
in  favor  of  sustaining  the  compromise  of  1850,  on 
the  one  side,  and  those  who  wished  to  deny  to 
the  South  the  most  important  boon  granted  to  it 
by  that  compromise  on  the  other,  that  the  bill 
should  be  made  strictly  conformable  to  precedents 
in  all  its  other  details.  Otherwise,  the  friends  of 
the  compromise  of  1850  might  be  divided  about 
details  having  no  bearing  on  the  main  issue. 

The  bill  for  establishing  a  territorial  govern 
ment  for  Washington  Territory  had  then  but 
recently  passed,  and  had  become  a  law  BY  THE 

APPROVAL  AND   SIGNATURE  OF  MR.  FlLLRIORE.       It 

was  taken  as  the  precedent  on  which  to  frame  the 
measure.  I  place  side  by  side,  for  comparison, 
the  sections  of  the  two  bills,  in  regard  to  the  quali 
fications  of  voters: 

Kansas  and  Nebraska  bill.  IVashin^tan  bill. 
"That  every  free  white  "That  every  white  male 
male  inhabitant  above  the  inhabitant  above  the  age  of 
age  of  twenty-one  years, who  twenty-one  years,  who  shall 
shall  be  an  actual  resident  of  have  been  a  resident  of  said 
said  Territory,  and  shall  pos-  Territory  at  the  time  of  the 
sess  the  qualifications  here-  passage  of  this  act,  and  shall 
inat'ter  prescribed,  shall  be  possess  the  qualifications 
entitled  to  vote  at  the  first  hereinafter  prescribed,  shall 
election,  and  shall  be  eligible  be  entitled  to  vote  at  the  first 
to  any  office  within  the  said  election,  and  shall  be  eligible 
Territory  ;  but  the  qualifica-  to  any  office  within  the  said 
tions  of  voters,  and  of  hold-  Territory  ;  but  the  qualifica- 
ing  office,  at  all  subsequent  tions  of  voters,  and  of  hold- 
elections,  shall  be  such  as  ing  office,  at  all  subsequent 
shall  be  prescribed  by  the  elections,  shall  be  such  as 
Legislative  Assembly:  Pro-  shall  be  prescribed  by  the 
aided,  That  the  right  of  suf-  Legislative  Assembly:  Pro- 
frage  and  of  holding  office  vi<led,  That  the  right  of  suf- 
shall  be  exercised  only  by  frage  and  of  holding  office 
citizens  of  the  United  States,  shall  be  exercised  only  by 
and  those  who  shall  have  de-  citizens  of  the  United  States 
clared,  on  oath,  their  inten-  above  the  age  of  twenty-one 
tion  to  become  such,  and  years,  and  those  above  that 
shall  have  taken  an  oath  to  age  who  shall  have  declared 
support  the  Constitution  of  on  oath  their  intention  to  be- 
the  United  States  and  the  come  such,  and  shall  have 
provisions  of  this  act." —  taken  an  oath  to  support  the 
Statutes  at  Large,  vol.  10,  Constitution  of  the  United 
page  285.  States,  and  the  provisions  of 
this  act." — Statutes  atLarge, 
vol.  10,  p.,  174. 

Comment  is  unnecessary. 

But  not  content  with  letting  unnaturalized  for 
eigners  vote,  for  which  there  was  some  excuse, 
'as  they  had  voluntarily  come  to  our  country,  and 
formally  declared  their  intention  to  cast  their  lota 
among  us,  Mr.  Fillmore  approved  and  signed  the 
bills  for  the  admission  of  Utah  and  New  Mexico, 
both  of  which  contained  the  following: 

"  SEC.  5.  Every  free  white  male  inhabitant  above  tha 
age  of  twenty  one  years,  who  shall  have  been  a  resident 
of  said  Territory  at  the  time  of  the  passage  of  this  act,  shall 
be  entitled  to  vote  at  the  first  election,  and  shall  be  eligible 
"to  any  office  within  the  said  Territory."  ***** 
•'Provided,  That  the  right  of  suffrage,  and  of  holding  office, 
shall  be  exercised  only  by  citizens  of  the  United  States, 
including  those  recognized  as  citizens  by  the  treaty  with  the 
Republic  of  Mexico,  concluded  February  2,  1848." — Stat 
utes  at  Large,  vol.  9,  p.  454,  Utah  bill;  vol.  9,  p.  449,  Ne» 
Mexico  bill. 

Approved  September  9,  1850. 

To  show  that  we  were  under  no  treaty  obliga 
tion  to  permit  them  to  vote,  nor  even  allow  them  to 
become  citizens,  except  when  we  thought  proper, 
I  give  the  article  of  the  treaty  with  Mexico  re 
lating  to  the  subject: 

"Mexicans  *****  shall  be  incorporated 
into  the  Union  of  the  United  States,  and  be  admitted  at 
the  proper  time,  (to  be  judged  of  by  the  Congress  of  the 
United  States,)  to  the  enjoyment  of  all  the  rights  of  citizens 
of  the  United  States,  according  to  the  principles  of  the 


14 


Constitution." — Treaty  with  Mexico ,  Statutes  at  Large,  vol. 
9,  p.  930. 

If  it  is  so  shocking  to  permit  foreigners  to  vote 
who  have  voluntarily  come  to  our  country,  and 
filed  their  intention  to  make  it  the  home  of  them 
selves  and  their  children,  what  is  to  be  thought 
of  Mr.  Fillmore  for  permitting  foreigners  to  vote 
who  had  not  come  in  voluntarily,  but  had  been 
whipped  in,  conquered  by  our  arms,  and  forced 
into  subjection  to  our  laws  ? 

It  may  be  as  well  to  remark,  that  the  first  Legis 
lature  of  Kansas,  in  prescribing  the  qualifications 
of  voters,  excluded  all  foreigners  from  voting  ! 
who  had  not  been  naturalized.  (Laws  of  Kansas, 
"  Elections,  "section  11.)  So  that  the  ills  so  con 
fidently  predicted  have  not  flowed  from  permitting 
them  to  vote  at  the  first  election. 

The  next  specification  is  on  the  "  corruptions 
which  pervade  some  of  the  departments  of  the  I 
Government. "    Shades  of  Gardiner  and  Galphin  !  j 
Whither  have  you  fled,  that  your  deeds  are  so 
goon   forgotten  !  !     If  any  one   thing   above   all 
others  signalized  the  administration  of  Mr.  Fill- 
more,  and  distinguished  it  from  all  its  predeces 
sors   and   successor,   it   was   "  the   corruptions 
which  pervaded  some  of  the  departments;"  not 
confined   to   subordinates  and   contractors,   but 
reaching  to  the  very  highest  officers  under  him 
intrusted  with  the  management  of  affairs.  I  wish  I 
had  the  figures  and  the  facts  illustrating  Galphin- 
ism  and  Gardinerism;  but  I  have  not,  and  must 
pass  them  by.     If  it  had  been  known  that  Mr. 
Fillmore  would  be  the  candidate,  this  count  would 
certainly  never  have  been  placed  in  the  indict-  j 
ment.      For  integrity,  industry,  and  fidelity  to  j 
the  public  interests,  1  believe  this  Administration  j 
may  safely  challenge  a  comparison  with  any  of 
its  predecessors,  and  I  shall  remain  of  that  opin 
ion  until  something  more  than  a  vague  and  unsup 
ported  charge  can  be  shown  against  it. 

Mr.  Chairman,  on  a  full  examination,  I  find 
little  in  this  platform  to  approve,  and  nothing  that  j 
the  warmest  Know  Nothing — the  most  ardent 
crusader  against  foreigners  and  the  Pope — must 
not  admit  to  be  of  less  importance  than  the  defeat 
of  the  Black  Republican  candidate.  I  appeal  to  j 
no  section  of  the  country,  but  to  the  friends  of  the 
Constitution  and  the  Union  everywhere,  to  lay 
aside — or  at  least  to  postpone  for  a  time — bicker 
ings  on  minor  questions,  and  come  up  to  the  great 
work  of  maintaining  the  Constitution  and  the 
Union  of  our  fathers.  Bad  men  are  assailing 
them;  laborious  men  are  sapping  their  founda 
tions;  and  able  men  are  striving  to  destroy  the 
fraternal  feeling,  without  which  the  Union  would 
be  a  curse.  Can  we  not  unite  to  drive  out  the 
vermin  that  are  tearing  out  the  cement  which 
binds  together  the  massive  blocks  of  the  edifice  ? 
If  we  cannot,  then  are  we  unworthy  the  legacy 
our  fathers  gave  us. 


If  foreignism  and  Catholicism  are  evils,  they 
;  are  northern ,  not  southern  evils.  We  of  the  South 
!  are  not  afflicted — if  their  presence  is  an  affliction — 
I  with  any  considerable   quantity  of  either.     The 
!  great  body  of  the   Know  Nothings  north  have 
I  refused  to  let  their  southern   allies   rid  them  of 
I  their  evils,  unless  they  are  permitted  in  turn  to 
!  rid  us  of  what  they  regard  as  our  peculiar  evil — 
i  slavery.    Failing  to  get  the  consent  of  their  south- 
;  ern  associates  to  any  such  Keciprocity  of  kind 
I  offices,  they  have  abandoned  "the  order,"  and 
joined  with  the  Black  Republicans  in  a  war  on 
|  the  South.     Let  the   southern  Know  Nothings 
!  in  like  manner  cease  their  war  upon  the  "  pecu- 
!  liar  institution"  of  the  North,  and  uniting,  for  the 
|  time  being  at  least,  with  the  Democratic  party, 
|  aid  us  to  achieve  a  victory  over  sectionalism  and 
fanaticism — aid  us  to  maintain  the  Constitution 
|  and  the  Union — aid  us  to  strike  down  the  trea 
sonable   flag    of  Black   Republicanism,  with  its 
sixteen  stars,  and  bear  aloft  that  old  flag  of  thirty- 
one  stars,  whose  increasing  galaxy  is  emblematic 
of  the  increasing  glories  of  the  Republic.     Let 
them  conquer  themselves,  and  all  the  old  preju 
dices  of  party,  and  aid  us  to  achieve  the  salvation 
of  the   Republic  by  the   triumphant   election  of 
BUCHANAN  and  BRECKINRIDGE. 


APPENDIX. 

Extract  from  the  speech  of  Hon.  Samuel  Ji.  Smith,  of  Ten 
nessee,  delivered  in  the  House  of  Representatives,  rfpril  4? 
1856. 

"  Now,  who,  I  ask,  were  those  who  elected  that  gentle- 

j  man,  [Mr.  BANKS  ?]  I  have  before  me  the  names  of seventy- 

'  five  members,  elected  as  Know  Nothings,  who  voted/or  the 

gentleman  from  Massachusetts  for  Speaker.     On  the  final 

ballot  it  will  thus  be  seen  that,  of  those  elected  to  thin 

i  House  by  the  Know  Nothings,  or  Americans,  severity-five 

voted  for  the  gentleman  from  Massachusetts   [Mr.  BANKS] 

i  for  Speaker;  and  that  gentlemen  may  examine  the  classifi- 

j  cation  1  have  made  and  correct  any  eVror  that  may  be  in  it. 

I  give  the  names  as  follows  : 

"  Know  Nothings,  or  Americans,  voting  for  Banks  on  the 
final  ballot: 

"'Messrs.  Albright,  Allison,  Ball,  Barbour,  Bennett  of 
New  York.  Binghain,  Bishop,  Bradshaw,  Burfinton,  Burlin- 
game,  Campbell  of  Pennsylvania,  Campbell  of  Ohio,  Chat'- 
fee,  Clark  of  Connecticut,  Clawson,  Colfax,  Comins,  Co- 
vode,  Cragin,  Cumback,  Damrell,  Davis  of  Massachusetts. 
I  Dean,  De  Witt,  Dick,  Dodd,  Durfee,  Edie,  Flagler,  Gallo 
way,  Grow,  Hall,  Harlan,  Holloway,  Howard,  King,  Knapp, 
Knight,  Knowlton,  Knox,  Kunkel,  Letter,  Mace,  Matteson. 
McCarty,  Miller  of  New  York,  Morrill,  Norton,  Pearce, 
Pelton,  Pennington,  Perry,  Pike,  Purviance,  Ritchie,  Rob- 
bins,  Roberts,  Robison,  Sage,  Sapp,  Sherman,  Stanton, 
Stranahan,  Tappan,  Thorington,  Thurston,  Todrt,  Trafton, 
Tyson,  Walbridge,  Waldron,  Watson,  Welch.  Wood,  and 
Woodruff. 

"  To  the  first  list  must  be  added  the  name  of  Mr.  Speaker 
!  BANKS,  who,  it  is  well  known,  was  the  champion  of  the 
|  Order  in  this  House  during  the  Thirty-Third  Congress.  The 
Speaker  of  this  House,  at  his  election,  received  the  votes 
of  seventy  five  members  who  were  elected  by  the  Know- 
Nothings,  and  twenty-eight  who  were  elected  by  the  Aboli 
tionists,  or  Republicans,  and  did  not  receive  the  vote  of  a 
single  member  of  the  Democratic  party." 


TO  THE  VOTERS 

OF   THE 


FOURTH  CONGRESSIONAL  DISTRICT 

OF 

NORTH  CAROLINA. 


The  views  presented  in  the  accompanying  communication,  would  have 
reached  you  in  the  form  of  a  "  Buncombe  "  speech  on  the  floor  of  the  House 
of  Representatives,  but,  from  January  until  within  a  short  time  past,  the  state 
of  my  health  has  not  been  such  as  to  admit  of  any  exertion  in  speaking ;  and 
now  that  only  twenty  working  days  of  the  session  remain,  with  business 
enough  unacted  on  to  employ  the  House  for  months,  I  do  not  feel  that  it  would 
be  just  to  the  House  or  the  country  for  ine  to  consume  one-fourth  of  a  day's 
sitting  in  discussing  a  subject  on  which  no  present  action  is  asked  in  Congress. 
Hence  I  have  adopted  the  ancient  mode  of  presenting  to  you  my  views  in 
the  form  of  a  circular. 

Very  respectfully, 

Your  obedient  servant, 

L.  O'R  BRANCH. 
WASHINGTON  CITY,  May  12,  1858, 


07  3HT  OT 


TO 


K 


O'l 


)  HI  Ji 


DISTRIBUTION  OF  PUBLIC  LANDS. 


I 

INCREASE  OF  TAXATION. 


At  the  commencement  of  its  present  session,  Congress  was  informed  by  the 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury  that,  in  consequence  of  the  sudden  and  unforseen 
commercial  revulsion,  the  means  of  the  Government  were  insufficient  to  meet 
the  demands  upon  it ;  and  on  his  recommendation,  Congress  authorized  him 
to  borrow  twenty  millions  of  dollars,  to  be  repaid  in  one  year  from  date.  It  is 

Generally  understood,  though  not  yet  officially  communicated  to  Congress,  that 
aving  exhausted  the  twenty  millions  already  borrowed,  he  will  be  compelled 
to  ask  for  authority  to  borrow  thirty  millions  more,  to  enable  him  to  carry  the 
Government  through  the  crisis  with  untarnished  credit.  Thus  it  will  be  seen, 
that,  after  using  all  its  income  from  public  lands,  tariff,  and  other  sources,  the 
Government  will  probably  be  compelled  to  borrow  fifty  millions  of  dollars 
during  the  present  and  next  years  to  meet  its  obligations.  There  is  not  only  no 
surplus  in  the  treasury,  but  the  Secretary,  with  the  aid  of  the  twenty  million 
loan,  can,  with  difficulty,  meet  the  daily  demands  made  upon  him,  and  im 
portant  public  works  ordered  by  Congress,  remain  unexecuted.  Even  if  there 
should  be  a  revival  in  business,  his  embarrassments  must  be  still  greater  next 
year,  because  then  he  is  to  provide  for  the  regular  and  ordinary  appropriations 
Congress  is  now  making  for  the  service  of  that  year ;  and  in  addition  to  repay 
the  twenty  millions  already  borrowed. 

At  this  juncture,  when  every  prudent  public  officer  is  endeavoring  to  husband 
the  resources,  and  reduce  the  expenses  of  the  Government,  so  that  it  may  meet 
its  pecuniary  engagements  without  laying  additional  taxes  on  the  people,  a 
party  has  arisen  in  North  Carolina,  which  urges  me  and  my  colleagues  to  vote 
in  favor  of  a  proposition  to  withdraw  from  the  treasury  the  proceeds  of  the 
sale  of  the  public  lands,  and  give  it  to  the  States,  to  enable  them  to  build  rail 
roads.  I  do  not  believe  there  are  ten  members  of  the  House  who  would  vote 
for  such  a  proposition,  unless  the  peculiar  representatives  of  the  manufacturing 
interest  would  do  so,  for  the  sake  of  the  bounty  it  would  afford  to  their  friends, 
and  I  am  not  sure  that  there  is  one  member  who  would  take  upon  himself  the 
responsibility  of  proposing  it  to  Congress  at  this  time.  If  it  should  be  proposed, 
I  intend  to  vote  against  it ;  and  the  object  of  this  communication  is  to  state  the 
reasons  of  my  opposition.  These  reasons  are  giveri  in  deference  to  the  opinions 
of  many  respectable  and  intelligent  persons  amongst  my  constituents  whose 
errors  even,  are  entitled  to  respectful  consideration,  and  who  are  not  likely  to 
err  when  fully  informed. 

Before  proceeding  to  my  main  object,  I  desire  to  say  that  the  vote  I  gave 
at  the  last  session  of  Congress,  in  company  with  all  my  colleagues,  and  one-half 
the  Representatives  from  Virginia,  to  deposit  the  surplus  revenue  with  the 
States,  in  no  degree  sanctions  distribution.  The  two  measures  are  not  only 
totally  unlike,  and  founded  on  different  principles,  but  they  are,  and  have 
always  been,  antagonistic  measures.  In  1836,  Gen.  Jackson,  Mr.  Calhoun,  Mr. 
Buchanan,  and  every  leading  Democrat,  except  Mr.  Benton,  adopted  deposit 
as  the  adversary  policy  to  distribution.  The  former  being  the  Democratic 
policy — the  latter,  Whig  policy.  The  Democratic  party  favors  low  tariffs  and 
no  surplus  in  the  treasury ;  but  when  its  opponents,  in  their  eagerness  to  favor 
the  manufacturing  interest  keep  the  tariffs  so  high  as  to  accumulate  a  surplus 


in  the  treasury,  our  policy  is  to  return  the  money,  as  nearly  as  may  be,  to  the 
people  from  whom  it  ought  not  to  have  been  taken,  by  depositing  it  with  the 
States  until  it  is  called  for  by  the  Government,  and  reducing  the  tariff  tax  to 
the  point  at  which  it  will  bring  in  no  more  money  than  is  needed  to  defray 
expenses.  In  giving  that  vote,  we  were  carrying  out  that  policy,  and  striving 
to  defeat  the  schemes  of  the  speculators  and  plunderers  who  were  hanging 
around  Congress  corrupting  its  members,  and  polluting  the  fountains  of  legis 
lation.  The  surplus  no  longer  exists,  and  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  another  will 
never  be  accumulated.  Unworthy  appeals  to  the  cupidity  of  the  States,  are 
constantly  made  by  the  advocates  of  distribution ;  and  the  people  are  told 
of  the  streams  of  gold  to  flow  into  their  State  treasuries  if  the  lands  are  divided. 
Fortunately,  we  are  not  without  experience  as  to  the  depth  and  volume  of  the 
stream,  and  it  is  not  sufficient  to  tempt  the  virtue  of  even  a  poor  and  frugal 
people.  In  1841,  an  act  was  passed  distributing  the  proceeds  of  the  public 
lands  amongst  the  States,  under  which,  North  Carolina  received  for  "its 
share,"  $23,147 — not  enough  to  pay  for  one  mile  of  railroad.  On  the  other 
hand,  in  1836,  there  being  a  surplus  in  the  treasury,  arising  almost  exclusively 
from  the  tariff  on  imports,  instead  of  squandering  it  on  political  favorites,  and 
in  useless  works  to  favor  particular  localities,  the  Democratic  party  deposited 
it  with  the  States.  Under  that  law,  the  deposit  act,  North  Carolina  received 
$1,433,757,  which  now  constitutes  a  part  of  her  school  fund.  This  is  no 
argument  in  favor  of  surpluses.  They  are  amongst  the  greatest  evils  that  can 
befall  us.  But  how  pitiful  is  the  bribe  offered  by  distribution  of  the  lands ! 
"Whenever  there  is  a  surplus  in  the  treasury  that  can  be  spared  without 
rendering  necessary  an  increase  of  taxes,  the  Democratic  policy  of  deposit  allows 
the  States  to  have  the  use  of  it ;  but  it  refuses  to  take  from  the  mass  of  the 
people  by  taxation,  in  order  to  give  to  a  few  by  distribution.  There  being  no 
surplus,  but,  on  the  contrary,  a  deficiency  of  means,  let  us  see  what  will  be  the 
effect  of  withdrawing  the  land  money  from  the  treasury.  If  we  take  the 
average  of  the  last  three  years,  we  will  find  that  it  requires  to  pay  the  expenses 

of  the  Government  for  each  year $70,544,944 

Of  this,  the  land  brings  in 8,178,744 

Leaving  to  be  raised  by  taxation 862,366,200 

(See  Annual  Report  of  the  Secretary  of  Treasury,  p.  281.) 

This  last  sum  is  raised  by  a  tariff  on  imports,  the  operation  of  which  I  will 
explain,  by  taking  iron  and  sugar  for  examples.  A  merchant  brings  into  the 
country,  from  abroad,  ten  dollars'  worth  of  iron  or  sugar ;  when  he  lands  it,  he 
is  compelled  to  pay  at  the  custom-house,  as  tax  to  the  Government,  two  dollars 
and  a  half.  Of  course,  when  he  sells  it  to  the  farmer,  he  is  obliged  to  charge 
twelve  dollars  and  a  half  for  that  which  he  could  have  sold  for  ten  dollars,  if 
he  had  paid  no  tax  on  it.  So  with  almost  every  article  used  by  the  people. 
More  than  one-fourth  of  every  store  account  paid  by  a  farmer  goes  to  the 
Government.  This  is  indirect  taxation,  and  it  is  four  times  as  great  as  the 
direct  tax  which  is  collected  by  the  sheriff;  the  indirect  tax  paid  by  the  people 
of  North  Carolina  to  the  Federal  Government  being  about  two  millions  of 
dollars  per  year. 
If  the  lands  or  their  proceeds  are  divided  amongst  the  States, 

the  Government  will  still  need .,. $70,544,944 

Whilst  the  present  tax  law  only  brings  in .''. 62,366,200 

It  is  clear  that  Congress  must  increase  the  tax,  so  as  to  bring  into 

the  treasury  the  difference  of . . . .  .",VJ ..  .'^. $8,178,744 

That  is  a  common  sense  proposition 'which  no  one  will  dispute.     If  Govern 
ment  gives  away  the  property  on  which  it  has  relied  in  part  to  pay  its  expenses, 


it  must  increase  the  taxes,  for  they  are  its  only  remaining  resource,  or  go  into 
bankruptcy.  When  the  increase  is  made,  the  additional  tax  imposed  upon 
North  Carolina  would  be  $279,616 — our  present  State  tax  being  only  about 
$450,000.  To  give  a  realizing  idea  of  the  increase,  I  will  say  that  a  person  now 
paying  ten  dollars  to  the  sheriff  for  State  tax,  will  be  required  to  pay  in  addi 
tion,  six  dollars  to  the  Government  to  make  up  the  deficiency  caused  by  the 
division  of  the  land  money. 

Not  wishing  to  complicate  my  statements,  I  have  not  alluded  to  certain  in 
cidental  expenses,  which  will  make  the  tax  in  reality  much  larger  than  I  have 
stated.  For  instance,  to  collect  eight  million  of  dollars  by  sale  of  lands,  and 
place  it  in  the  treasury  here,  and  then  divide  it  out  amongst  the  States,  and 
collect  eight  millions  more  from  the  people  by  a  tariff  to  replace  it,  involves 
large  expenses  for  agents,  and  heavy  drawbacks.  The  home  manufacturer  also 
takes  his  bounty  on  every  increase  of  the  tariff.  Intelligent  men  can  estimate 
these  additions  for  themselves.  I  think  I  could  demonstrate  that  the  tax  on 
the  people  will  be  double  what  I  have  estimated  it,  but  without  goingintoany  con 
troverted  calculations  it  is  great  enough  to  show  that  this  is  simply  a  proposition 
to  increase  taxes  for  the  benefit  of  schemers,  without  any  corresponding  advan 
tages  to  the  people. 

I  yield  to  no  one  in  my  appreciation  of  the  importance  of  railroads.  They 
are  the  great  civilizcrs  of  the  age — the  grandest  triumph  of  man's  in 
tellect — the  greatest  achievement  of  mind  over  inert  matter.  I  hope  to 
see  the  time  when,  without  any  material  increase  of  taxation,  every 
farmer  in  my  State  will  be  able  to  deposit  a  load  of  produce  at  a 
railroad  depot,  and  return  home  at  night.  In  our  State  the  locomotive 
has  waked  up  the  sleeping  energies  of  a  great  people,  and  is  transforming 
wasted  fields  into  blooming  gardens,  and  arousing  men  and  women  from  the 
dull  and  heavy  sleep  that  dwells  with  satisfaction  upon  the  past,  into  the 
bright  intelligence  that  looks  to  a  glorious  future.  The  Democratic  party 
is  pledged  to  the  policy  of  improving  the  State  by  railroads  as  rapidly  as 
its  means  and  resources  will  justify.  Since  1850  we  have  constructed  more 
than  400  miles  of  first-class  roads  from  our  own  resources  alone — for  two 
successive  years  the  superintendent  of  common  schools  has  reported  one  hun 
dred  and  fifty  thousand  of  our  children  at  school ;  and  yet  the  distribution- 
ists  delight  to  represent  North  Carolina  as  steeped  in  ignorance  and  languish 
ing  in  poverty.  Shame  upon  those  who  would  disparage  their  OWH  State,  and 
refuse  her  all  credit  for  the  bounding  advance  she  is  making  in  prosperity  and 
intelligence.  If  she  should  derive  money  from  the  distribution  of  the  public 
lands  with  which  to  push  on  her  improvements  more  rapidly,  her  people  will 
have  to  be  taxed  to  supply  the  deficiency  thus  made  in  the  Federal  Treasury; 
and  if  they  are  to  be  taxed,  I  would  rather  it  should  be  done  by  her  own  leg 
islature,  the  members  of  which  are  responsible  to  the  people,  than  by  Congress, 
whose  members  are  not  responsible  to  them,  and  are  often  hostile  to  their 
interest. 

Much  as  I  prize  railroads,  I  am  unwilling  to  see  my  constituents  taxed  to 
build  them,  except  by  their  own  representatives  in  the  State  Legislature,  at  such 
time,  in  such  manner,  and  to  such  extent  as  they  deem  wise  and  prudent. 

I  aver,  then,  that  if  at  any  time  distribution  would  be  expedient,  it  is  highly 
inexpedient  at  the  present. 

1.  Because  the  Government  is  in  debt,  and  borrowing  money  to  carry  on  its 
operations,  and  of  course  cannot  spare  eight  millions  of  dollars  per  annum. 

2.  Because  it  would  render  necessary  a  large  increase  of  the  tariff  tax. 

3.  Because  it  is  a  covert  attempt  to  take  from  the  people  more  money  than 
their  immediate  representatives  dare  to  take  from  them  for  railroads. 

4.  Because  it  makes  Congress  the  tax  gatherers  for  the  States,  thereby 
endangering  the  independence  of  the  States,  and  placing  the  property  of  my 


8 

constituents  at  the  mercy  of  a  body  not  responsible  to  them,  and   always 
indifferent — often  hostile  to  their  interests. 

I  proceed  now  to  some  more  general  considerations  touching  the  question. 
From  a  very  early  period  in  our  history,  the  ownership  of  the  unappropria 
ted  lands  lying  within  the  limits  of  the  Union  has  been  a  subject  of  angry 
contention.  It  is  well  known  that,  after  having  embittered  the  days  of  the 
Confederation,  it  retarded  the  "formation  of  a  more  perfect  Union,"  some  of 
the  States  refusing  to  ratify  the  Constitution  and  join  the  Union  without  a 
guarantee  of  the  equal  rights  they  claimed.  Happily  our  ancestors  were  as 
just  as  they  were  wise  and  brave ;  and  it  seeming  just  that  they  who  got  the 
lands  should  pay  the  expenses  of  acquiring  them  from  Great  Britain,  and  vice 
versa,  that  they  who  paid  the  expenses  should  have  the  lands,  all  the  States 
surrendered  their  claims  to  the  Federal  Government  on  its  assuming  the  pay 
ment  of  the  Revolutionary  debt.  Thus  easily  did  common  sense  and  common 
honesty  dispel  the  cloud  that  darkened  the  very  dawn  of  our  existence  as  an 
independent  nation,  and  stamp  upon  the  very  frontispiece  of  the  Constitution 
an  illustrious  example  of  unselfish  patriotism. 

The  lands  thus  became  the  property  of  the  new  Government,  to  be  used  and 
disposed  of  as  all  its  powers  were  to  be  exercised,  for  the  equal  benefit,  as  near 
as  might  be,  of  the  people  of  each  and  all  the  States.  They  are  not  the  pro 
perty  of  the  States,  nor  of  the  people,  and  to  say  that  the  Government  holds 
them  as  an  agent,  or  as  a  trustee,  for  the  States,  is  not  only  unwarranted  by 
anything  contained  in  its  title  papers,  but  is  attributing  to  it  a  character  with 
which  it  cannot  be  invested  by  any  action  of  itself  or  of  the  States,  save  in  the 
manner  pointed  out  for  amending  the  Constitution.  Holding  the  land  for  the 
"common  defense  and  general  welfare,"  it  would  be  a  violation  of  its  duty,  so 
long  as  it  continues  to  hold  it  at  all,  to  apply  it  to  the  separate  use  of  all  or 
a  part  of  the  States.  So  long  as  the  Government  continues  to  own  the  land, 
it  must  be  applied  to  the  common  as  contradistinguished  from  the  separate  use 
of  the  States,  and  can  be  applied  in  no  other  way.  Occasional  grants  of  rea- 
sonable  amount,  made  to  improve  its  property,  or  to  purchase  exemption  from 
taxation,  do  not  violate  this  principle. 

North  Carolina  is  entitled  to  share  equally  with  Illinois  and  Arkansas,  in  pro 
portion  to  their  respective  contributions,  in  the  advantages  to  be  derived  from 
the  public  lands.  And  whatever  system  will  secure  to  North  Carolina,  and  to 
every  other  State,  the  enjoyment  of  this  equal  right,  ought,  in  my  opinion,  to 
be  adopted.  Our  State  will  be  exact  and  strictly  just  in  the  ascertainment 
of  rights — but  when  her  rights  are  recognized,  no  State  will  be  more  ready  to 
unite  in  making  liberal  grants,  not  violating  the  above  principles,  for  the  bene 
fit  of  settlers  in  the  wilderness,  a  large  portion  of  whom,  in  every  new  State, 
have  issued  from  her  loins,  and  to  whose  welfare  she  is  neither  hostile  nor  in 
different. 

Until  after  the  extinction  of  the  Revolutionary  debt,  which  occurred  during 
General  Jackson's  administration,  no  proposition  was  made,  so  far  as  I  know, 
to  treat  the  public  lands  otherwise  than  as  a  fund  to  be  applied,  like  all  other 
funds  of  the  Government,  to  the  payment  of  its  debts  and  expenses.  Since 
that  time  various  propositions  have  been  made,  all  having  for  their  object  to 
deprive  the  Government  of  the  revenue  it  derives  from  them,  and  all  based  on 
the  fallacious  idea  that  the  revenue  is  no  longer  needed.  If  the  political  mil- 
lenium  had  arrived  when  the  affairs  of  governments  might  b«  conducted  with 
out  money,  then,  indeed,  we  might  banish  the^tax-gatherer  and  the  Custom 
house  officer — and  not  only  the  public  lands,  but  the  navy,  and  all  other  pro 
perty  of  the  Government,  might  be  given  away.  But  no  such  happy  lot  has 
befallen  us. 

I  have  shown  that  the  people  of  the  United  States  are  taxed,  heavily  taxed, 
for  the  support  of  their  Government,  and  cunning  men  are  constantly  devising 


new  schemes,  like   the  present,  to  increase  the  burdens  of  the  many  for  the 
benefit  of  the  few. 

I  propose  to  present  my  views  in  regard  to  such  of  the  distribution  schemes 
•is  have  advocates  enough  to  make  them  worthy  of  attention — and  the  question 
I  propose  to  myself  is,  WHAT  POLICY  WILL  MOST  CERTAINLY  SECURE  TO  EACH 

AND  ALL  THE  STATES,  AN  EQUAL  PARTICIPATION  IN  THE  BENEFITS  DERIVED  FROM 
THE  PUBLIC  LANDS  ? 

The  policy  which  best  fulfils  this  requirement  is,  in  my  judgment,  the  consti 
tutional  and  expedient  policy.  Equality  is  the  end ;  distribution,  sale,  division, 
are  but  means  to  the  end. 

I.  THE  HOMESTEAD  PROPOSITION. 

That  is  a  proposition  to  give  one  hundred  and  sixty  acres  of  land,  free  of 
charge,  to  any  person,  native  or  foreigner,  who  will  go  and  live  on  it.  This  is 
a  favorite  project  with  the  Red  and  Black  Republicans,  and  I  am  sorry  to  say, 
finds  some  advocates  in  the  Democratic  ranks.  Having  discussed  it  very  fully 
at  the  first  session  of  the  last  Congress,  I  do  not  propose  to  dwell  on  it  now. 
My  views  on  it  will  be  found  in  Appendix  to  Cong.  Globe,  1st  Sess.  34th  Con 
gress.  It  is  vagabondism  made  meritorious — idleness  and  improvidence  re 
warded.  My  present  purpose  leads  me  only  to  inquire  whether  it  would  operate 
equal!}',  whether  for  good  or  for  evil,  on  all  the  States  of  the  Union — which  is 
sufficiently  answered  by  the  simple  statement  that  it  is  a  proposition  to  use  the 
common  property  to  bribe  our  population  to  leave  us,  and  that  a  citizen  of 
North  Carolina  cannot,  whilst  he  remains  such,  take  advantage  of  it.  He  must 
cease  to  be  a  citizen  of  North  Carolina,  and  become  a  citizen  of  one  of  the 
Western  States,  in  order  to  entitle  himself  to  the  bounty  of  his  Government. 

II.  THE  ANNUAL  DISTRIBUTION  AMONGST  THE  STATES  OF  THE  MONEY  ARISING 
FROM  THE  SALES  OF  LAND.    ' 

There  is  something  in  the  idea  of  making  the  States  of  the  Union  regular 
recipients  of  money  from  the  Federal  Treasury,  standing  dependants,  if  not 
supplicants,  and  annual  pilgrims,  if  not  mendicants,  to  the  federal  head,  shock 
ing  to  all  my  notions  of  the  relations  that  ought  to  subsist  between  the  two 
authorities.  Nothing  is  better  calculated  to  destroy  the  just  influence  of  the 
States  as  checks  on  federal  abuses,  and  the  members  of  State  Legislatures  will 
soon  feel  themselves  released  from  all  the  usual  incentives  to  economy  when 
they  can  transfer  the  responsibility  of  imposing  taxes  to  a  distant  and  compara 
tively  irresponsible  authority.  It  is  the  tax  bill  that  brings  home  to  each  indi 
vidual  voter  the  enormity  of  extravagant  expenditures,  and  few  legislators 
would  practice  economy  if  they  were  under  no  responsibility  for  the  tax  bill 
necessary  to  meet  their  appropriations. 

Another  objection  to  this  plan  is,  that  such  a  system,  even  if  by  unjust  com 
pliances  in  the  first  instance  it  could  be  passed,  could  not  be  saved  from  repeal 
except  by  the  old  States  constantly  submitting  to  the  exactions  of  the  new 
States.  Creating  no  vested  rights  for  the  future,  there  would  be  unceasing  agi 
tation  for  its  repeal ;  and  we  know  that  it  would  be  repealed,  not  only  from 
our  knowledge  of  the  increasing  strength  of  the  land  States,  but  from  our  ex 
perience  at  a  former  period,  when  those  States  were  much  less  potent  in  Con 
gress  and  Presidential  elections  than  at  present. 

In  September,  1841,  an  act  was  passed  by  Congress  for  the  distribution  of 
the  proceeds  of  the  public  lands  amongst  the  States.  It  provided  that  ten  per 
cent,  of  the  net  proceeds  of  sales  within  their  limits,  should  be  paid  to  the 
States  of  Ohio,  Indiana,  Illinois,  Alabama,  Missouri,  Mississippi,  Louisiana,  Ar 
kansas,  and  Michigan ;  that  each  of  these  nine  States  should  be  entitled  to 
select  and  take  five  hundred  thousand  acres,  and  that  the  balance  of  the  pro 
ceeds  should  be  divided  semi-annual ly  amongst  all  the  States,  the  nine  above 
enumerated  included,  according  to  federal  population.  The  favored  nine  new 


10 

States  took  their  princely  grants  of  half  a  million  acres  each,  to  which  they 
acquired  a  vested  right  on  the  passage  of  the  act,  and  of  which  no  subsequent 
repeal  of  the  law  could  divest  them.  The  States  all  got  one  semi-annual  divi 
dend,  amounting  to  a  mere  pittance ;  and  on  30th  August  following,  less  than 
one  year  after  its  passage,  and  by  the  same  Congress  that  had  passed  it,  the  act 
was  repealed.  It  was  pretended,  at  the  time,  that  the  act  was  for  the  benefit 
of  the  old  States,  and  to  secure  to  them  "their  share  of  the  public  lands;"  but 
the  sole  effect  of  it  was  to  make  magnificent  grants  to  the  land  States  that  had 
already  received  so  much.  We  have  no  right  to  attribute  fraudulent  designs 
to  others  merely  because  their  acts  result  fraudulently,  but  it  is  a  significant 
fact  that  the  individuals  who  had  passed  it,  almost  without  exception,  voted 
for  the  bill  by  which  it  was  repealed.  Such  is  our  experience,  and  all  the  ex 
perience  we  have  of  the  distribution  policy.  I  respectfully  submit  that  the 
policy  is  not  thereby  commended  to  our  approval.  Of  subsequent  distribution 
schemes  the  most  famous  is — 

III.  "BENNET'S  LAND  BILL." 

It  proposed  to  give  to  the  new  States  quantities  varying  from  one  to  four 
millions  of  acres  each,  and  amounting  in  the  aggregate  to  about  forty  millions 
of  acres — about  double  the  area  of  the  State  of  North  Carolina — and  to  divide 
the  balance  equally  amongst  all  the  States,  the  preferred  States  included.  Or, 
in  other  words,  after  the  new  States  had  selected  out  all  that  was  worth  having, 
the  old  States  were  to  be  graciously  permitted  to  take  upon  themselves  the 
burden  of  the  refuse  and  worthless  land,  which  would  have  been  worse  for  us 
than  a  gift  of  the  whole  to  the  new  States,  because  it  would  have  imposed 
upon  us  a  burden,  without  the  possibility  of  a  benefit.  The  act  of  1841  was 
bad  enough,  but  Bennet's  bill  was  as  much  worse  as  the  new  States  were 
stronger.  The  new  States  are  still  stronger  now,  $nd  growing  more  so  every 
day;  and  when  distribution  is  talked  of  now,  I  mean  with  those  who  alone  have 
strength  to  pass  it,  it  means  giving  all  the  proceeds  of  the  lands  to  the  new 
States,  leaving  the  expenses  of  acquisition  and  management  to  be  borne  out 

of  the  common  treasury. 

jilt  ')o  feiiotjoii  'fi'-<  iifc  oj  mn 

IV.  The  next  project  is,  THE  DIVISION  OF  THE  LANDS  THEMSELVES  AMONGST 
THE  STATES.     Much  that  I  have  said  about  the  distribution  of  the  proceeds, 
will  equally  apply  to  this  project.     It  possesses  one  advantage,  however,  in 
this  :  if  such  an  act  was  passed,  it  could  not  afterwards  be  repealed  so  as  to 
divest  the  title  out  of  the  States.     It  would  be  a  final  and  complete  disposition 

.  of  the  subject  so  far  as  Congress  is  concerned.  In  addition  to  which,  many 
think  it  more  free  from  constitutional  difficulties ;  but,  there  are  objections 
peculiar  to  this  plan,  which  I  will  briefly  notice. 

The  plan  contemplates  an  equal  division  by  metes  and  bounds,  having  re 
gard  to  quality,  value,  location,  &c.,  and  the  assignment  to  each  State  of  its 
share  to  be  holden  in  fee  simple.  There  is  something  grand  in  the  idea  of  thus 
parcelling  out  the  Rocky  mountains,  with  its  buffalo,  its  wolves,  and  its  Indians; 
but  we  might  as  well  attempt,  with  chain  and  compass,  to  parcel  out  the  stairy 
firmament  above  us,  so  as  to  assign  to  each  State  an  equal  number  of  the 
happy  beings  with  whom  the  imagination  delights  to  people  those  planets,  that 
in  their  majestic  course  through  the  heavens  look  down  upon  us  with  such 
steady  effulgence.  If  we  attempt  a  division,  according  to  quality  and  value, 
it  would  be  impracticable,  because  the  vast  wilderness  is  unexplored,  and  mor 
tal  man  cannot  now  assign  bounds  to  the  fertile  land  and  circumscribe  the 
barrens.  If  we  divide,  by  parallels  of  latitude  and  longitude,  it  would  be 
found,  when  the  wave  of  settlement  had  reached  and  opened  it  to  view,  that 
some  States  had  got  the  barren  and  uninhabitable  steppes  that  constitute  a 
]arge  part  of  it,  whilst  others  had  got  the  valuable  river  bottoms  and  fertile 
plains.  No  system  of  policy  ought  to  receive  the  approbation  of  a  statesman, 


11 

that  trusts  the  affairs  of  nations  to  luck,  and  leaves  whole  empires  to  the  des 
tiny  assigned  them  by  fickle  chance. 

But  suppose  this  difficulty  overcome,  and  that  North  Carolina  has  assigned 
to  her,  by  metes  and  bounds,  with  rivers  and  mountains  for  her  boundaries,  a 
fertile  and  valuable  tract  of  her  own  size  this  side  the  Rocky  mountains.  Who 
is  to  remove  hostile  Indians,  and  keep  off  intruders?  The  Constitution  forbids 
the  States  from  keeping  troops,  making  treaties,  or  engaging  in  war,  without 
the  consent  of  Congress.  We  can  neither  adopt  the  policy  of  the  Roman 
Senate  and  ransom  our  lands  with  money,  nor,  like  the  stern  old  general  of 
the  empire,  cast  the  sword  into  the  scale.  We  can  neither  treat,  nor  fight, 
except  under  the  gracious  and  merciful  supervision  of  Congress,  whilst  savage 
tribes,  or  lawless  intruders,  may  occupy  every  foot  of  our  land.  But  suppose 
the  savage  and  the  squatter  respect  our  rights,  a  whole  army  of  surveyors  and 
their  assistants,  agents,  registers,  and  receivers,  are  to  be  employed  and  paid  by 
North  Carolina,  to  prepare  the  lands  for  sale,  and  to  sell  them.  Her  people 
must  be  burdened  with  a  large  present  expenditure,  with  but  a  remote  and 
uncertain  prospect  of  the  reimbursement  of  part  of  it  to  our  children.  If  the 
people  are  to  be  still  further  taxed,  I  would  rather  see  the  money  expended  in 
improving,  and  rendering  more  valuable  the  land  we  have  at  home.  Con 
flicting  claims  would  soon  lead  to  feuds  between  individual  States  •,  those  feuds 
would  soon  kindle  into  civil  war,  and  instead  of  furnishing  homes  to  peaceful 
emigrants,  seeking  to  better  their  fortunes  as  at  present,  the  western  lands 
would  be  battle-fields  for  hostile  armies,  and  the  strongest  arm  would  hold 
them  bathed  in  fraternal  blood. 

There  is,  however,  a  more  serious  difficulty  than  any  I  have  yet  mentioned. 
The  States,  within  whose  limits  the  public  lands  are  embraced,  are  bitterly 
hostile  to  this  policy,  and  will  do  all  they  can  to  defeat  its  passage  and  thwart 
its  execution.  They  say  that  whilst  they  are  willing  for  their  soil  to  be  owned 
in  such  large  quantities  by  the  Federal  Government,  they  will  not  submit  to 
the  individual  States  standing  in  the  same  relation  to  them.  Arkansas,  for  in 
stance,  protests  that  she  will  never  permit  Massachusetts,  or  any  other  State, 
hostile  to  her  institutions,  to  own  large  portions,  perhaps  more  than  half,  of  the 
soil  within  her  limits.  What  Southern  man  will  say  she  ought  to  permit  it  ? 
The  attempts  of  Massachusetts,  by  means  of  emigrant  aid  societies,  to  con 
trol  the  institutions  of  Kansas— the  still  more  recent  organization  of  a  similar 
society  to  colonize  Virginia,  for  the  purpose  of  abolishing  slavery — her  fanati 
cal  and  impertinent  interference  in  the  affairs  of  others  throughout  all  her 
past  history,  leave  us  no  room  to  doubt  with  what  joy  she  would  embrace  any 
policy  that  would  enable  her  to  plant  her  batteries  in  the  heart  of  the  feeblest  of 
the  slaveholding  States;  nor,  can  we  doubt  for  a  moment,  what  sort  of  settlers  she 
would  place  there,  and  what  use  she  would  make  of  her  position.  The  States 
have  the  power  to  protect  themselves  against  this,  in  the  unlimited  power  they 
possess  of  taxing  all  the  lands  within  their  limits.  They  would  tax  the  lands 
belonging  to  States  no  heavily  as  to  compel  the  owners  to  abandon  them.  If 
any  one  doubts  their  right  to  tax  them,  I  will  only  remind  him,  that  although 
the  question  as  to  the  right  of  a  State  to  tax  lands  belonging  to  the  United 
States,  has  never  been  decided  by  the  Supreme  Court,  yet  Congress  has  al 
ways  acted  on  the  assumption  that  the  States  do  possess  the  right,  and  on  the 
admission  of  every  new  State,  enters  into  a  compact  with  it,  whereby  the  State, 
in  consideration  of  a  certain  payment  to  it  by  the  United'  States,  binds  itself  not 
to  tax  its  lands.  If,  however,  there  is  any  well-founded  doubt  as  to  the  right 
to  tax  the  property  of  the  United  States,  (and  eminent  lawyers  differ  about  it,) 
there  is  no  doubt  about  their  right  to  tax  the  land  or  other  property  of  indi 
vidual  States,  £nd  there  is  no  authority  in  the  Government  that  can  limit  or 
restrain  its  exercise. 

A  notable  display  of  this  jealousy,  on  the  part  of  the  new  States,  and  of  sub- 


12 

mission  to  their  demands  by  Congress,  is  to  be  found  in  the  bill  introduced  by 
Mr.  MORRILL,  of  Vermont,  which  passed  the  House  of  Representatives  a  few 
days  since,  providing  for  a  distribution  of  lands  to  the  States  for  the  benefit  of 
agricultural  colleges.  The  first  section  grants  to  each  State  a  quantity  of  land, 
equal  to  twenty  thousand  acres,  for  each  Senator  and  Representative  in  Con 
gress.  The  second  section  provides : 

"  And  whenever  there  are  public  lands  in  a  State,  worth  $1  25  per  acre,  (the  value  of 
said  lands  to  be  determined  by  the  Governor  of  said  State,)  the  quantit}'  to  which  said 
State  shall  be  entitled,  shall  be  selected  from  such  lauds,  and  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior 
is  hereby  directed  to  issue  to  those  States  in  which  there  are  no  public  lands  of  the  value 
of  $1  25  per  acre,  land  scrip  to  the  amount  of  their  distributive  shares  in  acres  under 
the  provisions  of  this  act;  said  scrip  to  be  sold  by  said  States,  and  the  proceeds  thereof 
applied  to  the  iises  and  the  purposes  prescribed  in  this  act,  and  for  no  other  use  or  pur 
pose  whatsoever :  Provided,  That  in  no  case  shall  any  State  to  which  land  scrip  may  thus 
be  issued,  be  allowed  to  locate  the  same  within  the  limits  of  any  other  State,  but  their 
assignees  may  thus  locate  said  laud  scrip  upon  any  of  the  unappropriated  lands  of  the 
United  States,  subject  to  private  entry." 

By  this  simple  arrangement  the  States  which  have  public  land  within  their 
limits  are  secured  against  competition,  and  will  be  able  to  get  land  worth, 
perhaps,  ten  or  twenty  dollars  per  acre.  Whilst  North  Carolina,  and  other 
States  having  no  public  lands  within  their  limits,  are  not  even  allowed  to  lo 
cate  their  scrip  in  the  Territories,  but  are  required  to  sell  it  in  the  market  for 
sixty  or  eighty  cents  per  acre.  This  is  one  of  the  vaunted  distribution  schemes 
for  voting  against  which  my  colleagues  and  myself  will  be  denounced.  It  is 
a  fair  sample  of  all  the  distribution  projects — giving  the  shell  to  the  old,  and 
the  kernel  to  the  new  States. 

V.  IT  IS  PROPOSED  TO  ISSUE  SCRIP  TO  THE  STATES  IN  EQUAL  PROPORTIONS, 
WHICH  THEY  MAY  SELL. 

The  opposition  candidate  for  Governor,  (Mr.  McRae,)  in  his  letter  to  Mr. 
Dancy,  recently  published  in  the  newspapers,  says : 

"What,  then,  do  I  propose?  I  propose  that  Congress  shall  withdraw  all  the  public 
lands  in  the  territories  from  sale  for  ten  years ;  to  issue  land  warrants  in  sections  and 
quarter  sections,  <fcc.,  to  the  governors  of  the  several  States,  according  to  their  federal 
population,  for  two  hundred  millions  or  thereabouts,  the  number  still  remaining  undis 
posed  of  in  the  land  States,  perhaps  two  hundred  and  fifty  millions,  which  warrants 
will  be  subject  to  sale  like  the  soldiers'  land-warrants,  and  located  when  sold,  by  the  pur 
chaser.  This  plan  will  get  rid  of  the  difficulty  about  one  sovereign  holding  domain  in  the 
limits  of  another,  and  about  the  taxation  of  these  lands  by  the  States  in  which  they  lie, 
for  the  title  will  remain  in  the  General  Government  till  the  location." 

It  will  be  seen  that,  like  MORRILL'S  bill,  it  does  not  contemplate  allowing  the 
old  States  to  locate  their  scrip  on  the  best  land  they  can  find,  but  they  are  com 
pelled  to  sell  it  for  what  it  will  bring  in  the  market.  I  think  I  can  show  that 
of  all  the  plans  yet  proposed  that  profess  to  let  the  old  States  come  in  for  a 
share,  this  is  the  most  unjust  and  injurious  to  the  old  States.  It  is  proposed  to 
issue  land  warrants  for  two  hundred  million  acres,  and  give  them  to  the  thirty- 
two  States  to  sell.  Let  it  be  borne  in  mind  that  that  number  of  acres  will 
cover  an  area  six  times  as  great  as  the  whole  State  of  North  Carolina.  That 
much  land  would  not  be  wanted  by  actual  settlers  in  twenty  years ;  yet  we 
would  have  thirty-two  States  acting  independently  of,  and  in  competition  with, 
one  another,  and  forcing  that  amount  on  the  market  at  once.  Of  course  the 
States  would  strive  to  undersell  one  another,  speculators  would  take  advantage 
of  the  competition  to  put  down  the  price  of  the  warrants,  and  "our  share" 
would  probably  not  bring  into  our  treasury  five  cents  per  acre,  out  of  which 
agents,  brokers,  and  commissions  would  have  to  be  paid.  Experience  is  always 
a  safer  guide  than  mere  speculation,  and  fortunately  we  are  not  without  expe 
rience  on  this  subject.  By  reference  to  the  report  of  the  Commissioner  of  the 
General  Land  Office,  page  83,  it  will  be  seen  that  the  whole  amount  of  land 


13 

warrants  issued  to  the  old  soldiers  from  1847  to  September  30,  1857,  was 
53,689,870  acres,  being  an  average  of  five  millions  and  a  fraction  for  each  year. 
Every  old  soldier  who  has  had  a  warrant  within  two  or  three  years,  knows 
that  all  he  could  get  for  it  was  about  eighty  cents  per  acre,  although  the  lowest 
Government  price  for  the  land  is  $1  25  per  acre ;  and  much  of  the  time  the 
warrants  could  not  be  sold  for  eighty  cents.  And  this,  too,  notwithstanding 
that  tnere  has  been  more  demand  for  land  in  the  last  three  or  four  years  than 
ever  before.  Now  let  every  person  make  a  calculation  for  himself — if  putting 
upon  the  market  five  millions  of  acres  per  year  depresses  the  price  from  $1  25 
to  80  cents,  what  will  be  the  effect  of  putting  two  hundred  millions  of  acres  upon 
the  market  at  one  time  ?  Especially  when  it  is  considered  that  the  old  soldier 
was  not  obliged  to  sell  his  warrant,  but  could  have  it  located  if  the  price  did 
not  satisfy  him,  and  hold  the  land  for  a  rise ;  whilst  under  the  plan  we  are  dig- 
cussing,  the  States  cannot  locate,  but  must  sell  their  warrants  for  whatever 
they  will  bring.  In  my  opinion,  land  warrants  would  become  a  drug,  like  the 
old  Continental  money,  and  could  not  be  sold  at  all,  or,  if  at  all,  only  for  a 
nominal  price.  Who  would  be  bcnefitted  by  this  scheme  ?  Certainly  not  the 
old  States,  for  they  would  scarcely  get  enough  money  to  pay  expenses.  It 
would  be  equivalent  in  its  effects  to  giving  the  land  to  any  person  who  would 
take  it,  and  that  is  what  the  new  States  most  desire  ;  because  it  carries  popu 
lation  to  them,  an<f  enables  their  citizens  to  get  the  public  land  without  paying 
for  it.  If  it  is  to  be  given  to  any  who  will  take  it,  let  it  be  done  openly,  so 
that  we  may  say  that  we  have  been  robbed,  not  outwitted. 
The  expenses  of  surveying  and  selling  the  land,  amount  to,  per  year, 

(See  Estimates  of  Commissioner  of  Land  Office  for  1858) $984,210 

Annuities  paid  to  Indians  for  their  lands,  (See  Schoolcraft's  Re 
port,  vol.  vi) 1,804,332 

Making  an  annual  charge  of $2,788,542 

to  say  nothing  of  the  expenses  of  extinguishing  Indian  titles  hereafter. 

If  the  proceeds  of  the  sales  are  given  to  the  States,  these  sums,  constantly 
and  rapidly  increasing,  will  remain  a  charge  on  the  treasury,  for  which  the 
people  will  continue  to  be  taxed  after  the  lands  have  ceased  to  yield  a  dollar 
of  revenue  Verily,  it  must  be  believed  either  that  the  people  of  North  Caro 
lina  are  stupid  and  cannot  comprehend  when  they  are  taxed,  or  that  they  are 
rich  and  liberal,  and  rejoice  under  their  burdens. 

Other  schemes  have  been  proposed  by  individuals  which  I  do  not  think  it 
necessary  to  discuss,  because  no  considerable  number  of  persons  are  now  advo 
cating  them.  Mr.  Calhoun  offered  in  the  Senate,  in  1840  or  1841,  a  bill  to 
cede  the  lands  to  the  States  in  which  they  lie,  on  condition  that  they  would 
pay  over  to  the  United  States  a  certain  portion,  one-half,  I  believe,  of  the  gross 
proceds ;  his  estimate  being  that  it  required  the  other  half  to  pay  expenses  of 
sale,  &c.  That  might  possibly  be  made  the  basis  of  an  equitable  disposition, 
provided  we  could  obtain  a  guarantee  that  the  States  would  comply  with  the 
conditions.  Mr.  Hunter,  of  Virginia,  proposed  in  the  Senate,  in  1854,  a  plan 
whereby  the  States  might  purchase  the  lands  from  the  Government,  at  a  re 
duced  price.  I  am  not  familiar  with  the  details  of  his  plan,  but  have  great 
confidence  in  his  ability  and  the  soundness  of  his  principles.  I  apprehend, 
however,  that  one  difficulty  stands  in  the  way  in  all  these  plans,  to  wit:  that  no 
one  of  them  can-  pass  Congress  unless  it  contains  provisions  grossly  unjust  to 
the  old  States. 

And  I  feel  an  assurance  that  any  person  who  favors  distribution  now,  is 
yielding  a  principle  which  in  ten  years  will  result  in  leaving  us  the  expenses 
to  pay,  and  giving  to  the  new  States  all  the  beneficial  proceeds.  If  the  prin 
ciple  of  distribution  is  once  established,  the  majority  will  arrange  the  details, 
and  the  barrier  being  thrown  down,  you  can  no  longer  control  and  distribute 


u 

the  rushing  waters.  The  character  and  fate  of  the  act  of  1841,  make  it  certain 
that  at  no  time  since  the  final  payment  of  the  Revolutionary  debt  has  it  been 
practicable  to  pass  and  maintain  any  distribution  act,  unless  it  was  so  partial 
to  the  new  States  as  to  induce  them  to  vote  for  it,  and  I  am  convinced  that  at 
this  time  those  States  would  accept  no  change  of  policy  which  was  not  practi 
cally  a  cession  of  the  lands  to  the  States  in  which  they  lie.  The  moment  it  is 
established  that  the  Government  can  dispense  with  the  revenue  derived  from 
the  public  land,  or  that  revenue  thus  derived  differs  from  other  revenue,  and 
ought  not  to  be  used  to  pay  the  ordinary  expenses  of  the  Government — at 
that  moment  the  whole  of  that  revenue  will  be  applied  to  the  exclusive  use 
and  benefit  of  the  new  States.  Those  in  the  old  States  who  arc  laboring  to  con 
vince  the  people  that  that  branch  of  revenue  possesses  some  peculiarity  making 
it  legitimate  to  use  it  as  it  would  not  be  legitimate  to  use  other  revenue,  are  un 
wittingly  or  blindly  aiding  to  bring  about  the  very  state  of  things  they  so  much 
deprecate ;  for  whenever  we  unsettle  and  depart  from  the  existing  policy,  all 
the  changes  will  be  to  the  disadvantage  of  the  old  and  minority  States. 
And  this  brings  me  to  the  consideration  of  the  existing  policy,  which  is — 

VI.  To  SELL  THE  LANDS  AT  A  FAIR  PRICE,  PLACE  THE  MONEY  IN  THE  TREA 
SURY  TO  BE  USED  LIKE  ANY  OTHER  MONEY,  IN  PAYING  THE  EXPENSES  OF  THE 
GOVERNMENT,  AND  REDUCE  THE  TARIFF  TO  THAT  EXTENT.  % 

This  system  is  mathematically  equal  and  just  to  all  the  States;  under  it  the 
country  has  prospered  to  an  extent  without  a  parallel  in  the  history  of  the  world, 
and  having  in  its  favor  the  prestige  of  past  success,  and  the  self-sustaining 
strength  which  more  than  fifty  years  of  actual  trial  gives  to  it,  it  will  be  easier 
to  maintain  it  against  the  increasing  strength  and  bolder  demands  of  the  new 
States,  than  to  establish  any  new  system  equally  just  to  all. 

Many  persons  are  under  the  impression  that  the  public  lands  have  ceased  to 
be  a  source  of  revenue  to  the  Government,  and  that  they  are  being  squandered 
for  the  benefit  of  the  new  States.  The  grant  of  lands  to  the  Illinois  Central 
Railroad  is  often  spoken  of  as  improvident  and  unjust,  and  it  is  supposed  by 
many  persons  that  that  road  was  built  out  of  the  lands  granted  by  Congress, 
and  cost  its  stockholders  nothing.  To  what  extent  the  land  gave  the  company 
credit,  I  am  not  able  to  say,  but  I  have  before  me  a  statement  from  which 

it  appears  that  the  road  cost $25,940,344 

Of  which  the  company  borrowed 21,509,729 

And  stockholders  paid  in.. ..-..» 4,430,615 

The  road  was  built  with  money  borrowed  in  Europe,  and  not  out  of  the 
proceeds  of  lands.  The  lands  could  not  be  made  available  to  pay  their  debts 
as  they  became  due,  and  the  last  time  I  heard  of  it,  the  company  was  insolvent, 
and  its  road  and  other  property  had,  I  believe,  passed  into  the  hands  of  a  re 
ceiver  for  the  benefit  of  its  creditors.  In  no  instance,  so  far  as  I  know,  have 
these  land  grants  proved  of  much  value  to  the  grantees ;  and  those  who  attribute 
to  them  the  rapid  growth  of  the  Western  States,  fall  into  a  very  great  error. 
Their  growth  was  just  as  rapid  before  Congress  had  given  an  acre  to  railroads. 
The  true  cause  of  their  unparalleled  prosperity  is  to  be  found  in  their  fertile 
soil  and  noble  rivers,  and  in  the  immense  tide  of  emigration  they  receive  from 
Europe.  I  am  told  that  some  of  the  Northwestern  States,  keep  agents  in 
New  York,  and  even  send  them  to  Europe  to  electioneer  for  emigrants ;  and 
a  stranger  on  hearing  the  distribution  speakers  in  North  Carolina,  and  reading 
their  newspapers — depicting  in  glowing  terms  the  prosperity  and  attractions  of 
the  Northwest,  and  the  poverty,  and  ignorance,  and  backwardness  of  their 
own  State — might  suppose  that  they  had  their  missionaries  travelling  through 
North  Carolina,  stimulating  our  people  to  emigrate.  The  land  grants  benefit 
them  but  little,  if  at  all,  for  they  go  into  the  hands  of  speculators,  who  are 
often  non-residents. 


15 

Large  grants  have  been  made  to  railroads,  but  they  have  all  been  on  the 
alternate  section  principle;  that  is,  the  Government  gives  every  alternate  section 
on  the  line  of  a  proposed  road  to  the  company  that  will  build  it,  and  doubles  the 
price  of  the  remaining  section — the  company  not  being  allowed  to  select  the 
best  land,  but  taking  it  as  it  comes.  By  such  an  operation,  the  Government 
obviously  loses  nothing,  and  the  friends  of  the  system  say  it  gains  by  being 
enabled  to  sell  what  otherwise  would  have  been  unsaleable.  I  shall  not  defend 
it.  I  have  voted  in  every  instance  against  such  grants ;  but  have  been  in 
fluenced  to  do  so,  less  by  any  great  wrong  I  can  discover  in  the  system  as  far 
as  developed,  than  by  an  indisposition  to  sanction  any  departure  from  the  old 
policy,  and  opposition  to  the  establishment  of  a  system  which  there  is  too  much 
reaso'n  to  fear  will  be  abused  iii  the  future.  The  grant  to  the  Illinois  Central 
Railroad  was  the  first,  and  most  important  made  by  Congress,  and  inaugurated 
the  policy.  It  was  voted  for  by  Messrs.  Badger,  Mangum,  and  Stanly,  of 
North  Carolina,  and  I  have  never  heard  that  their  friends  at  home  then  con 
sidered  it  as  squandering  the  public  lands.  That  our  estate  has  been  impaired 
by  misapplication  of  the  lands,  no  one  can,  or  will  question  ;  but  it  cannot  be 
said  justly,  that  it  has  been  done  to  an  extent  to  demand  of  us  a  resort  to 
desperate  expedients.  After  giving  about  fifty  millions  to  the  old  soldiers,  they 
still  relieve  the  people  of  taxation  to  the  extent  of  more  than  $8,000,000  per 
year. 

The  plan  on  which  the  lands  are  surveyed,  and  the  order  with  which  they 
are  brought  into  market,  are  worthy  of  all  admiration,  and  can  only  be  main 
tained  by  unity  in  their  management.  The  plan  of  survey  devised  by  Col. 
Mansfield  in  the  early  part  of  this  century,  admits  of  no  confusion  of  bound 
aries  and  lapping  of  titles,  such  as  in  the  old  States  fill  the  courts  with  litigation, 
and  the  hearts  of  citizens  with  anger  and  bitterness.  Instead  of  irregular 
figures,  running  from  post  to  tree,  and  from  tree  to  stump,  of  various  shapes 
and  uncertain  boundaries,  are  parallelograms  of  unvarying  contents  and  in 
destructible  boundaries.  The  Government  surveyor,  with  his  chain  and  compass, 
is  the  forerunner  of  freedom,  and  the  harbinger  of  civilization.  Ahead  of  both, 
he  plunges  into  the  wilderness,  and  with  no  guide  but  his  needle,  selects  some 
great  land-mark  for  his  initial  point.  From  this,  he  projects  on  the  heavens  his 
great  Base  and  Meridian  lines  as  the  basis  of  all  his  operations.  These  lines 
are  invisible  to  human  eyes,  and  unmarked  by  human  tools,  but  are  as  unvary 
ing  as  the  constellations,  and  incapable  of  obliteration,  whilst  the  sun,  and 
the  moon,  and  the  planets,  maintain  their  relative  positions.  To  the  north  and 
to  the  south,  to  the  east  and  to  the  west,  he  plants  his  mile  posts,  and  his  half- 
mile  posts — the  mute  and  inanimate  sentinels,  which  forecast  and  wisdom  place 
there  to  command  the  peace  and  preserve  harmony  amongst  the  thousands  of 
human  beings  who  shall,  through  all  time,  hold  these  lands.  The  perfect 
coincidence  of  all  his  lines  and  corners,  and  the  beautiful  harmony  of  all  his 
results,  however  he  may  have  ramified  or  meandered,  provided  only  he  has 
followed  his  compass,  and  departed  not  from  his  base  and  meridian,  are  strikingly 
typical  of  our  system  of  government.  The  needle  may  be  true  to  the  pole,  but 
it  is  not  more  true  than  is  our  race  to  the  principles  of  freedom  and  order. 
The  precepts  of  the  Constitution  are  the  great  base  and  meridian  lines  of  our 
political  system,  deep  graven  on  the  hearts  of  our  citizens,  and  incapable  of  ob 
literation.  So  long  as  we  shall  be  true  to  those  precepts,  and  faithful  to  our 
hereditary  principles,  we  may  expect  harmony  in  the  operations  of  our  complex 
government,  and  freedom  from  jarring  and  conflicts.  When  we  depart  from 
these  lines,  and  misplace  the  division  posts  between  the  various  departments  of 
Government,  or  wantonly  ihrow  down  those  marking  the  boundaries  between 
State  and  Federal  authority,  clashing  interests  and  conflicting  claims  will  soon 
fill  the  land  with  mourning  and  disorder. 

It  has  been  said  that  "  the  undevout  astronomer  is  mad,"  because  the  solar  sys- 


16 

tern  itself  proclaims  a  great  First  Cause,  omniscient  and  omnipotent,  and  he  woulc 
be  a  madman,  indeed,  who,  in  penetrating  its  depths,  and  tracking  its  planets 
should  fail  to  reverence  so  much  goodness  and  so  much  power.  So  American 
statesmen,  in  the  constant  contemplation  of  our  beautiful  land  system,  may  be 
imbued  with  lessons  of  devotion  to  the  Constitution,  and  adherence  to  princi 
pie.  In  following  those  guides,  they  may  sometimes  be  on  new  and  unknowi 
paths,  their  vision  may  be  obstructed,  and  they  may  be  unable  to  see  wher 
they  are  to  emerge — savage  foes  may  be  around  them,  and  the  firmament  ma; 
threaten — but  let  them  all  learn  to  follow  the  compass  and  stick  to  the  me 
ridian.  Nor  will  they  lead  astray  until  matter  is  in  revolt  against  God  au 
his  laws. 

I  yield  to  no  one  in  the  earnestness  of  my  desire  to  secure  for  North  Caro 
lina  a  just  participancy  in  the  benefits  to  be  derived  from  the  public  lands 
She  is  entitled  to  it ;  and  my  vote  will  never  be  wanting  in  favor  of  any  schem 
that  in  my  judgment  will  secure  it  to  her  more  effectually  than  the  presen 
policy.     None  of  the  schemes  heretofore  proposed  will,  in  my  judgment,  s 
well  effect  that  end,  as  the  existing  policy  of  selling  the  land,  placing  th 
money  in  the  treasury,  to  be  used  for  the  legitimate  wants  of  the  Governmen 
and  to  the  same  extent  reducing  the  tariff.     I  hold  the  maintenance  of  thi 
policy  to  be  one  of  the  fundamental  principles  of  the  Democratic  party.     Th 
Democrats  of  the  new  States,  on  all  other  questions,  and  most  of  them  on  th: 
question,  have  displayed  a  Roman  firmness  in  maintaining  the  right  against 
sectional  and  local  prejudice,  and  we  have  no  sufficient  reason  to  distrust  them. 
If  they  should  at  any  time  depart  from  that  cardinal  principle  of  the  party, 
which  guarantees  to  all  the  States  and  all  the  people  a  just  share  of  benefits 
from  the  public  property,  they  need  not  expect  the  continued  co-operation  of 
their  associates  in  the  injured  States.     They  certainly  would  not  receive  mine. 

I  have  faith  that  party  interest  will  restrain  them,  even  if  party  principles 
should  lose  their  potency ;  and,  in  that  faith,  I  will  trust  the  rights  of  my 
State  to  them  rather  than  to  those  who  have  opposed  every  acquisition  of  ter 
ritory,  whose  votes  have  passed  every  scheme  for  squandering  the  public  lands, 
and  who  never  had  a  fixed  principle  that  did  not  look  to  the  promotion  or  pro 
tection  of  class  interests. 

Of  the  large  quantities  granted  to  railroads  5,8*75,785  acres  were  given  under 
Mr.  Fillmore's  administration;  the  remainder  of  18,371,550  acres  was  given 
by  the  last  Congress,  in  which  the  House  of  Representatives  was  controlled  by 
the  Know-Nothings.  The  intervening  Democratic  Congress  refused  all  grants. 
Not  an  acre  of  the  public  land  has  ever  been  given  to  railroads  by  a  Democratic 
Congress.  Our  opponents  squander  the  lands,  and  then  urge  that  as  a  reason 
in  favor  of  distribution.  It  is  only  a  reason  for  keeping  them  out  of  power. 
Give  the  control  to  the  Democratic  party  and  the  land  will  not  be  squandered 

Having  thus  presented  to  you,  fully,  frankly,  and  I  think  I  may  say,  fairly 
my  views  on  the  whole  question  of  distribution,  I  will  make  no  apology  for 
addressing  you  at  this  time.  The  question  is  one  to  be  acted  on,  if  at  all,  by 
your  Representatives  in  Congress,  and  not  by  your  Governor  or  members  of  the 
Legislature.  I  do  not  question  their  right  to  discuss  it ;  they  certainly  eannol 
question  mine.  It  is  only  by  the  fullest  and  most  unreserved  communication 
between  the  representative  and  his  constituents,  that  they  can  know  whether 
he  is  worthy  of  their  confidence,  and  that  he  can  know  whether  he  possesses 
it. 

L.  O'B.  BRANCH. 


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